This charming man is at it again. Morrissey has published a statement on his website, Morrissey Central, in which he claimed that there is an “obvious media shift to delete [him] from being the central essence of The Smiths.”
In the blog post, titled “Cancel Culture Begins at Home,” Morrissey refuted apparent claims from Rough Trade Records founder Geoff Travis and unidentified media publications about The Smiths’ origins.
“Several news sites now claim that the initial meeting at Rough Trade Records was with ‘Johnny Marr and Andy Rourke,’ even though Andy wasn’t even a committed band member at that point,” Morrissey wrote. “The meeting, of course, was Morrissey and Marr. Even Geoff Travis has now suddenly decided that he ‘can’t remember who was with Johnny,’ even though Geoff looked me squarely in the eye on that very day and said ‘we’d like to release Hand In Glove immediately’” and he then more importantly said to me that his name was Geoff with a G, not Jeff with a J. The hounds are snapping!”
Morrissey asserted that he in fact “invented the group name, the song-titles, the album titles, the artwork, the vocal melodies, and all of the lyrical sentiments came from [his] heart… It’s a bit like saying Mick Jagger had nothing to do with the Stones.”
This, of course, is not the first time that Morrissey has displayed an arguably paranoid attitude surrounding his reputation — previously accusing Capitol Records of sabotaging his album for his “too diverse” viewpoints, and joking about his potential assassination in a television interview.
Morrissey signed off on the blog post stating that he will “fight to the last breath” to maintain that his central role in The Smiths is recognized.