Dear Morrissey . . .

Basically Tom Ewing's last paragraph otm

I don't get it, marcello. Are you suggesting that arthritic gnus are avid readers, easily enticed into reading rock memoirs, and that heath's review is worse than useless because it can't manage even that? Or is it the opposite, that arthritic gnus are not only illiterate but very hard to motivate into doing anything at all - but your aesthetic standards are so high that you will brook no criticism that won't accomplish this (demand the impossible &c)? Is "wouldn't entice an arthritic gnu" a saying I don't know or something? Are gnus with healthy joints more receptive to racist 80s indie singers, or less?

Wait don't answer any of that just tell me is the plural of gnu gnus or is it just gnu cause I fear I may have just made a fool of myself

Morrissey has never really understood the importance of production/engineering imo

yeah that's true. feels like his voice really meshed with the Smiths, the early solo stuff w/Stephen Street is still pretty good mix-wise but that's where things start to sound a little karaoke-esque and it just falls off steadily from there

I looked it up, it's gnus

Phew!

reference?

Gnua

glamorous gnu

it captures Morrissey's personality to perfection

^^^ this. was all I was asking for from this book and it doesn't disappoint. I don't give a fuck about subjects glossed over or missing details, I am not interested in standard rock star biopic narratives or "how was it done?" mechanics

harsh chords, explosive intensity

Some reviewers have found this unrevealing. I think it might be the most revealing memoir I've ever read, albeit sometimes unintentionally. People who think it would have been improved by in-depth stories about how he wrote This Charming Man puzzle me. Most music memoirs don't deliver the goods about songwriting anyway and most are much duller than this.

(If you do want that Smiths-geek insider detail, btw, Johnny Marr's Q&A in Daniel Rachel's Isle of Noises is fantastic, but I expect it from Marr.)

nv, Google brings up 5 results for "arthritic gnu". That's more than I was expecting, maybe it is a reference.

I think Heath was disappointed by Morrissey not being David Gedge.

Whereas Morrissey was disappointed by David Gedge not being ...

glamorous gnu

― Tip from Tae Kwon Do: (crüt), Tuesday, December 3, 2013 1:11 PM (57 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

YES.

We look to ILX
For the snark posts we write
Usenet is dead
Usenet is dead

Nothing gnu under the sun...

http://assets.amuniversal.com/980ed1f01dc7012ea5ca00163e41dd5b

The fuck?

http://www.stereogum.com/1589931/homosexual-relationship-edited-out-of-morrisseys-autobiography-in-the-u-s/news/

my friend at work is reading the UK version he ordered online and said the parts with the jake guy aren't really like super revealing or anything, just like...he's around when some story about crissy hynde happens and stuff, but nothing too revealing...he was confused as to why it would be taken out

Page after page of sniping rage
An English singe or an American tinge?

Irish balls English whinge?

The AmericaniZed spelling of words in this was weird, and annoying.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_spelling

I liked this bit:

http://distilleryimage1.ak.instagram.com/00d903be5e6711e3a58b0e76d35d513f_7.jpg

He was kinder about her when she died.

Well, there you go. Not enough salt in this world to take pinches of for the book.

By the way, for anyone interested, googling "a crisp packet would have caused more attention" in quotes leads you to an upload of the entire book on scribd.com.

Is it all in present tense/is all dialogue in italics/does he always use phrases like "i flick back"

Not gonna read it either way but curious as to the exact extent of bouncing back/I partridgeness here

"Luckily, I had the last laugh..."

The great thing about it is the intentionally funny bits are interspersed with unintentionally funny bits so I found the whole book hilarious.

a lot of it is in present tense but he sort of flits back and forth between that and past tense

it is v funny

It's not a good book book, but's it's a really terrific loo shelf book.

By contrast, that was a wonderful sentence.

xp soft, strong, and thoroughly absorbant

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_spelling

― Working Class Rejected Street Boot Brat (Noodle Vague), Friday, December 6, 2013 1:42 PM

It's not just that, it's dropping the u from words like colour, glamour etc. Just unexpected seeing it in a Penguin Classics book written by Morrissey, that's all. I mean, did he write it like this, or did Penguin change it? And why!?
But anyway.

So if you're in NYC on Thursday...

http://www.myfreeconcert.com/events/morrisseys-autobiography-book-signing

It's not just that, it's dropping the u from words like colour, glamour etc. Just unexpected seeing it in a Penguin Classics book written by Morrissey, that's all. I mean, did he write it like this, or did Penguin change it? And why!?

My guess (completely uninformed) is that he just typed this up in Word or whatever, with the default language set to US English. I can't imagine he knows how to change the setting, and he has a way with words and all, but he's always been pretty rough with the finer details of written and edited English. Apart from the US spellings, there are loads of things that would usually have been changed in an edit - the crazy tenses and parts that don't make sense, for example. I'm thinking the earlier dispute with Penguin was something like them saying, "We'll have to edit this shit," and him going, "My words must not be touched" till they backed down.

http://i.imgur.com/Y2qgaOF.png
http://i.imgur.com/uRkSzDO.png

You're just too busy
To see me
All around Union Square.

I took a walk
down Union Square
that fucker Morrissey
is never there

He'd better run run run run run etc.

"My guess (completely uninformed) is that he just typed this up in Word or whatever, with the default language set to US English"

I read somewhere that he'd written it in longhand, and the m/s was then scanned/OCR'd

chapter on his secret love of Mr SHankly in secret was removed by the freemasons - you didnt hear it here - davinichi code and more

Leonineo Davinichi

so far my most wtf sentence has been the one where he apparently contemplates procreating with some Iranian lady friend

He sang at the Nobel Prize concert yesterday in baggy grey trousers. Not as prestigious a gig as it sounds: James Blunt also performed.

Did he perform Baggy Trousers?

'Baggy Grey Trousers' should be the name of a Morrissey/Smiths cover band who do all the songs in the style of Madness.

{Suggs type voice}
Punctured bi-cy-cle
On a hi-ill-side
so desolate!
Will nature make a man of me yet? {horns: WAH WAH WAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!}

Beligerent ghouls in all the schools
headmasters breaking all the rules
spineless bastards innnn the pubbbbbb...