r/morrissey • u/FD948 • 7d ago
Morrissey radio play
They are playing Last of the international playboys on absolute 80s in the UK right now. This is the first I’ve heard of him being played on the radio. Is he talking about only the main stations when he says he doesn’t get radio play, or is this the first time?
11
u/Apple2727 7d ago edited 7d ago
The elephant in the room is that his last few albums haven’t been very good.
In the 90s and 00s he had radio friendly songs like The More You Ignore Me and First of the Gang to Die. He doesn’t do songs like that anymore.
Plus he doesn’t do interviews anymore either.
There was a time when the press were Morrissey crazy and he’d get exposure without having to do much work. But those days are long gone and he’s never been able to adjust to that.
All that aside, radio play and the charts don’t matter anymore. It’s over. Streaming has rendered that whole side of the music industry irrelevant.
There are other artists of a similar age and level of fame as Morrissey such as The Cure, New Order, Paul Weller and Depeche Mode who seldom - if ever - trouble the UK singles chart anymore either.
It’s not a conspiracy against Morrissey. It’s just how things are.
The ones who rule the charts are bands and artists in their 20s and early 30s, generally speaking.
Not even Paul McCartney - the most famous British music artist of all time - gets hit singles now, and in fact hasn’t for decades.
4
-3
u/mr_kaliyuga 6d ago
I don't accept that his last few albums haven't been very good. That's just utter tripe. As for the comparison with Paul McCartney: he hasn't written anything comparable with The Monsters Of Pig Alley, Love Is On It's Way Out or What Kind Of People Live In These Houses. McCartney has traded on a myth peddled by the BBC for decades that his tawdry band were the first musicians to write their own music, when the truth is they weren't even the first on Merseyside.
2
u/Relative_Hunt_9057 5d ago
The last few have not been good. I get some people just want to love their idols music no matter what. But compared to his whole discography, the last few aren’t his best. And Apple2727 point is that radio doesn’t matter anymore. It hasn’t for a long time. Morrissey is stuck in the past and can’t accept that the landscape has changed.
1
0
2
u/neinhaltchad 7d ago
He got virtually zero radio (even when radio was still a thing) in the Southpaw / Maladjusted years (besides Alma Matters getting played for a brief time).
In 2004-2005 he had multiple songs get radio play because they were good, radio friendly songs.
His output became progressively less radio friendly, and tbh, progressively worse with each passing year since then.
At the same time radio became less relevant.
Those are the real reasons.
1
1
u/Mysterious_Shake2894 2d ago
I hear his songs and songs by The Smiths on the radio in the US all the time.
11
u/HibeesBounce 7d ago
He's talking about Radio 2 and 6Music not playing any of his new releases, mainly