Morrissey

Description

Known for his outspoken and often controversial views on class, ethnicity and sexuality, Morrissey has remained an anti-establishment figure who continues to provoke argument, debate and devotion amongst critics and his many fans. Focusing exclusively on Morrissey’s solo career, the collected essays in this important book make for a rich reading of Morrissey and his highly influential creative output. Working across a range of academic disciplines and approaches (including musicology; ethnography; sociology and cultural studies) these essays seek to make sense of the many complexities of this global icon.

Sujets

• Arts visuels
• Arts visuels
• Histoire des Arts
• Histoire des Arts
• Histoire des arts visuels
• General officer
• Media studies
• Art
• General
• Cultural Studies
• History
• Music
• Film

Informations

• Publié par: Intellect Books Ltd
• Date de parution: 24 août 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 3
• EAN13: 9781841505800
• Langue: English

Extrait

Morrissey
Morrissey
Fandom, Representations and Identities
Edited by Eoin Devereux, Aileen Dillane and Martin J. Power
First published in the UK in 2011 by Intellect, The Mill, Parnall Road, Fishponds, Bristol, BS16 3JG, UK
First published in the USA in 2011 by Intellect, The University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA
Copyright 2011 Intellect Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Cover designer: Joe Gervin Copy-editor: Rebecca Vaughan-Williams Typesetting: Mac Style, Beverley, E. Yorkshire
ISBN 978-1-84150-417-9
Printed and bound by Gutenberg Press, Malta.
Contents
Acknowledgements
Preface
Introduction: But Don t Forget the Songs that Made You Cry and the Songs that Saved Your Life
Eoin Devereux, Aileen Dillane and Martin J. Power
Chapter 1: Suedehead : Paving the Pilgrimage Path to Morrissey s and Dean s Fairmount, Indiana
Erin Hazard
Chapter 2: The Seaside Town that They Forgot to Bomb : Morrissey and Betjeman on Urban Regeneration and British Identity
Lawrence Foley
Chapter 3: In the Spirit of 69? Morrissey and the Skinhead Cult
John H. Baker
Chapter 4: Fanatics, Apostles and NMEs
Colin Snowsell
Chapter 5: The Teenage Dad and Slum Mums are Just Certain People I Know : Counter Hegemonic Representations of the Working/Underclass in the Works of Morrissey
Martin J. Power
Chapter 6: In Our Different Ways We are the Same: Morrissey and Representations of Disability
Daniel Manco
Chapter 7: My So Friendly Lens : Morrissey as Mediated through His Public Image
Melissa Connor
Chapter 8: Because I ve only got Two Hands : Western Art Undercurrents in the Poses and Gestures of Morrissey
Andrew Cope
Chapter 9: Moz: art: Adorno Meets Morrissey in the Cultural Divisions
Rachel M. Brett
Chapter 10: Speedway for Beginners: Morrissey, Martyrdom and Ambiguity
Eoin Devereux and Aileen Dillane
Chapter 11: No Love in Modern Life: Matters of Performance and Production in a Morrissey Song
Eirik Asker i
Chapter 12: Vicar In A Tutu : Dialogism, Iconicity and the Carnivalesque in Morrissey
Pierpaolo Martino
Chapter 13: Smiths Night: A Dream World Created Through Other People s Music
Dan Jacobson and Ian Jeffrey
Chapter 14: Talent Borrows, Genius Steals: Morrissey and the Art of Appropriation
Lee Brooks
Chapter 15: I m Not The Man You Think I Am : Morrissey s Negotiation of Dominant Gender and Sexuality Codes
Elisabeth Woronzoff
Chapter 16: Melodramatic Morrissey: Kill Uncle , Cavell and the Question of the Human Voice
Johanna Sj stedt
Chapter 17: You Have Killed Me - Tropes of Hyperbole and Sentimentality in Morrissey s Musical Expression
Stan Hawkins
Notes on Contributors
Index
Acknowledgements
For all of their help and support the editors would like to thank:
Paul Boland; Boz Boorer; Len Brown; Ellie Byrne; The late Pat Bugler; Phil Collins; David Collopy; Sheena Doyle; Paula Dundon; Peter Finan; Joe Gervin; Girl in A Coma; Kerri Koch; Gavin Murphy; Anne McCarthy; Tina O Toole; Issac Ramos; Jelena Stanovnik and These Charming Men. At the University of Limerick we would like to acknowledge the support received from the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences; the Department of Sociology; Irish World Academy of Music and Dance and the Research Office. Grateful thanks to the following for their permission to reproduce original images: Douglas Cape; Andrew Cope; Erin Hazard; Graham Humphreys and Linder Sterling.
Individual thanks from each of the editors to the following:
Eoin Devereux: Liz, Joe and Gavin for all their love and all the laughs; Michael Breen for sound advice; Leo Halpin for talking to strangers in airports; Sarah Moore for all the support and encouragement and the Moz Posse - Ger Fitzgerald; Mikey Ryan; Natalie Harford and Jane Bruce for all of the Morrissey gigs and aftershows all over the world.
Aileen Dillane: The Gilbert boys, Lochlann, Senan and Rossa, and especially Hayden, for his unwavering support, and the Dillane Clan, Maureen, Seamus, Deirdre, Noreen, and, in particular, Fionnuala, for her advice and inspirational example.
Martin J. Power: For Marian and Fiona. Thanks to my family and friends for making me who I am. Thanks to Dr Amanda Haynes for moulding me into an academic. Last, but certainly not least, I would like to dedicate this book to the late Jimmy Farrell, a great friend who introduced me to The Smiths on a rainy Sunday afternoon in 1985. You are a light that never goes out .
And finally, thanks to Morrissey for the songs that saved our lives.
Preface
B ack in the winter of 2008, when I received advance warning of the University of Limerick s second academic symposium on Morrissey - The Songs That Saved Your Life (Again) - I emailed the charming Mancunian for his reaction. Having been voted second in the BBC s Greatest Living Icons poll - behind Sir David Attenborough, ahead of Sir Paul McCartney - I could not help remarking that this was another extraordinary achievement; to be celebrated by an international bunch of boffins with brains bigger than Bolton was surely a tremendous honour for a Salford lad who had suffered education in reverse and entered the world of work ( that four letter word!) with barely a couple of O-levels to cover his modesty.
Although initially my email met with radio silence, I would argue that Morrissey responded stylishly and humorously on the eve of the Symposium in April 2009 with the release of his I m Throwing My Arms Around Paris single. The supporting track - as throwaway-brilliant as many of The Smiths B-sides had been - opened with the lines: Because of my poor education, I don t expect your invitation .
The introduction to this enlightening collection of essays uses the phrase deliberate construction in relation to a man consumed with his public persona and its mediation . For the average human on the Chorlton omnibus, sporting a soiled Meat Is Murder T-shirt and a rain-soaked quiff, this means that Morrissey knows exactly what he is doing and, inspired by one of his teenage heroes Andy Warhol, closely controls how he presents himself and his art. There are no coincidences in the world of Morrissey. Nothing is accidental; everything is planned to perfection, from beautifully-crafted pop masterpieces and iconic photo opportunities to manufactured media controversies.
To me, Morrissey is a work of art. From the moment I first saw him onstage with The Smiths, back in the autumn of 1983, I felt there was something special, different, unusual, charismatic, awkward, abnormal, extraordinary, original (delete to taste) about the man. Getting to know him in my guise as an NME journalist and later as a TV producer and writer, I have never been disappointed by any of my encounters with the Moz. He has always been charming company, brilliantly witty, fantastically knowledgeable about popular culture and provocatively opinionated on subjects close to his heart. No one can ruffle feathers or rattle cages like him. True, there have been times when I have winced on hearing some of his more controversial views but, as my lovely long-lost Mum once observed, you ll learn nothing from only listening to people who agree with you .
It is hugely significant that this well-researched work on Morrissey has been spawned in the great cradle of Irish learning. The man himself remains fiercely proud of his Celtic roots, and Ireland has been the homeland of many ghostly muses who have inspired and illuminated Morrissey s work over the past 30 years. When scholars talk reverently about classical art forms, they stress how crucial it is that artists mirror life, that they speak fundamental and universal truths, and remind us why we are here. Swift s Gulliver s Travels declared that the function of art was to mend the world . Yeats passionately believed it was the role of the poet to speak the truth for his generation and defended the right of every man to see the world in his own way . While well-beloved Wilde claimed that the secret of life is art and argued that true artists must always seek to extend the subject matter of art.
In my entirely subjective opinion, Morrissey has extended the subject matter of popular music more than any other artist over the last 30 years. With his lovely singing voice , he has used the three-minute pop song to embrace society s outsiders and tackle taboo subjects with an old-fashioned, almost Victorian reforming zeal: everyday issues such as child murders, suicide, poverty, animal rights, violence, vegetarianism, racism, mental illness, football hooliganism, paedophilia and police corruption. The very subjects that 99.9 per cent of all recording artists avoid for fear they will smear their lovely careers are faced head-on in Moz songs. And if a double-decker bus crashes into us
No doubt some critics will argue that an old cult like Morrissey does not deserve such intense academic interrogation or investigation. I would passionately disagree. Middle-aged white blokes with beards (and nothing better to do) continue to write countless books analysing the artistic output of Bob Dylan, putting every mumbled word under the microscope, celebrating the genius of a twentieth-century lyrical wizard. Obviously Dylan qualifies as one of the great modern pop artists but he has said little to me since 1983 and his magic has rarely been mirrored in live performance. In contrast, onstage Morrissey is transformed from solitary, shy and disillusioned poet into one of the most charismatic and emotional performers of our or any time. You have to see it to believe it.
If you are even vaguely interested in original thinking on the art of pop culture, then - as if studying a living sculptu