On twerks, berks and jerks!

   

So, yeah, it's that time of year again - awards season - where those already blessed with too much money but never enough celebrity show up to get rewarded for all their hard work, on camera, among their peers, and watched by millions of ordinary people. That would be you and me, people! To be honest, I am over it, but Downton Abbey was a few minutes late starting so I got to catch the big ticket opener, and it was more than enough to have me screaming for PBS.

 

 

It was somehow inevitable that BeyJay would be asked to open the Grammys last Sunday, and it seems that no one was disappointed. Well, they are considered musical royalty today; a million miles away and many hundreds of millions of dollars on from whence they came. They are treated like the King and Queen of pop (Jay-Z is a pop star now?!) in 2014, if not actually the younger, hipper, richer and perhaps even more influential mirror image of that other power couple, Barack and Michele. 

 

 

But the similarities do end there, quite clearly, as demonstrated by someone's rear end being stuck up in the air and into the camera during her opening number, and, call me old-fashioned, but I found the entire scene to be totally lowest-common-denominator fodder for the salivating common-or-garden misogynist. Why would someone with the bank vault of raw power talent that our Beyonce has at her disposal choose to have the nation stare at her gyrating booty in black lingerie, instead of looking at her face and listening to what's being sung?

 

 

Which brings me to another point - the total hypocrisy of the media in their feverish adoration of some, and vicious savaging of others. Here's my question - how come everyone was appalled and totally shocked by a young single white woman twerking in white lingerie in front of millions, yet were almost universal in praise of a black woman, wife, and mother doing more or less the same in black lingerie? It seems that BeyJay have become such a powerful duo that lashings of praise is the only media response, if you wanna keep your job. Don't diss 'em, cos what Jay and his posse gonna do ain't nothin' compared to an angry whirlwind with Beyonce's name on it!

 

The nation gasped in horror at Miley Cyrus on the VMAs in 2013, after which she took a mountain of abuse, and yet the world sycophantically "oohed" and "aahed" at a newly slim mother showing what she's got and leaving little to anyone's imagination. The colour of the lingerie may be entirely coincidental, but are our reactions affected by the skin colour of the performer in each case? Is it a case of some type of inverse bias and judgement? Do we somehow find it more acceptable from one star than the other, or is it that we make more allowances for someone who appears to do it "with class" as opposed to "like (white) trash"?
 

I don't think it makes much difference actually - prancing around in front of the world in your underwear, sticking your rear end up to that world and gyrating it to provoke a crowd reaction pretty much adds up to the same thing from each woman - there's no difference, apart from one being a wife and mom to a very young child; if that does indeed make any difference in today's new world. But it's simply the age old adage - sex sells, people!
 

Social media and its use as a marketing tool has revolutionised the way business gets done in various industries, but perhaps none so pervasively as in the entertainment industry. One reason for this is because it not only allows the "product" (i.e. the star) 24/7 access to the "target" (i.e. audience/fans), but more importantly it provides the target 24/7 access to news/commentary about the product, including allowing the target into the actual conversation.
 

Speaking of Miley Cyrus, it is a marketer's wet dream that her VMA twerking episode caused a feeding frenzy on Twitter - she broke all records, and at her peak hit an astounding high note of over 300,000 tweets per minute. Now can you imagine trying to launch a new product or even doing follow-on marketing of an existing product, and getting almost a third of a million people globally, all talking about it simultaneously during even one minute of a typical 1440 minute day?! It's pure marketing orgasm, people!

Which brings me to my main point in this story. As much as we all reel in horror at the newly fashionable phenomenon of good-kid-gone-bad young star, we somehow all end up talking about it - right? While I will admit that the antics of the female stereotype of this new breed, a certain LiLo, is not a marketer's wet dream (well, she may still be but not in terms of sales ;) because unquestionably she hurt her career with all of her run-ins with the law.

Actors are not quite equal to musicians when it comes to being troubled wild child types because of differences in corporate culture in each industry. Musicians do their best work (writing) on their own, at home, even on their back in bed, but an actor needs to be on set and ready to work during the entire shooting of a movie, and needs to be insurable by the production company. On a big budget film, even a one day delay due to an out-of-commission actor can cost as much as $250,000 to the studio. Insurance for a troubled star the likes of LiLo (or a Robert Downey Jr. during his troubles) can cost as much as $1M and cause a ton of administrative bother for the producers. The key question in the face of a huge talent pool - why bother?

Musicians however are individual talents of (often) their own making, and apart from when out on tour, they belong to no one. They create their own art, are known for that art, and are the sole performers of that art. Actors merely learn their lines, imitate whoever they are paid to imitate, and are almost entirely replaceable. Even out on tour, musicians often get up to a variety of high jinks which is deemed par for the course, totally acceptable, or even potentially encouraged by marketing/record company types.

In today's world, bad behaviour is perhaps the greatest way of remaining in the public eye particularly for a fading star such as a Britney (notwithstanding her more recent return to business) or a LiLo. Of course, one is left to wonder if the star in question has worked this out for themselves, or is it subliminally implanted in their brain by a Machiavellian marketing maven, or both? In other words, have we come far enough that young stars in particular now are having the last laugh at the media, by using their "troubles" to great financial advantage?

If you are going to tell me that Beyonce did not wince for more than one reason following the Miley twerking escapade, then it will fall on deaf ears, I'm afraid. I am sure she may have had quite clear opinions on Miley's performance, naturally, but I bet the eyebrows were raised much more by the avalanche of free publicity that slid off the mountain afterwards. She isn't known for being publicity-shy, and she is known for wanting to be on our screens 24/7 - whether it be music, film, TV commercials, fashion shows, almost any photo opp (on a good day) or even gossip.

"That's it's JZ! I ain't gonna let no lil white girl show the world her bum as if she's some mama from the 'hood; who does she think she is, fool?"

"Uh huh, it's no big deal, woman!"

"What?! Who you talkin' to, boo? Hey J, I'm Bey! Her twerkin' her way to my kinda attention up there, and makin' a berk of Robin Thicke at the same time. No, wait, make that thick Robin!"

"Haha! Don't get yourself all irradiated, girl. It's just Miley, she ain't you, she gotta do that to get some attention off the Queen of Pop. She don't get enough of her own, so she tryin' to steal some of yours, girl!"

"Uh huhhhh?"

"Yea-ahhh! She lil milk bar Miley, she mizz Dizney, she ain't no Queen Bizney! Yo! Magna Carta, baby!"

"Is you tryin' to wind me up, daddy-o? No one steals publicity from me, for free, capiche?! This changes everythin'  big boy - get ready - we twerkin' at the Grammys!

"We whatttt?!"

"Hell, yeah! I gonna show that lil girl how a real woman do it!"

"You go, girl!"

"Uh huh. And don't go givin' me none of that Magna Carta hocus pocus, the closest you got to Magna Carta last night was more like a Magna Farta, child. You gotta lay off 'em refried beans, J!"

Perhaps it would not have gone quite like that, but you see my point, right? Any of these publicity-hugging attention-seeking money-hoarding types seeing Miley up there strutting it and cashing in on the response were bound to respond in the time-honoured fashion in entertainment - copy it. Clone it. Better still, better it. Bad behaviour is the new deep, and let's see how deep we can go! The only problem being that some then end up going sufficiently deep that they can't just shimmer up to the surface again, because the bends will kick in, so they have to stay down longer than they intended.

Which brings me to the best and most recent example of bad behaviour and the young megastar - we are of course referring to the Biebs. Can you beliebe what is going on these days? It's almost unbeliebable! He just can't seem to hold it together right now, and if you believe all the hype, he is heading down the vortex and spiralling out of control with no regard for his image or career. The cynical are already claiming that it's the beginning of the end, and on a bad day it might seem to hold true. His second arrest (today) in one week sort of says it all, sadly.

Quite why everyone is so shocked and/or upset with the Biebs is probably just another case of a Disney-type child star who was adored by millions of children (and their moms!) before he ever needed a razor blade (does he, today?!) suddenly and sadly, well, growing up. We like our child stars to remain young and innocent, primarily because a lot of the kids loving them still are, and it's a bitter pill to swallow to see the Biebs running around town with his jeans hanging off, underwear pulled up for all to see, and run-ins with the law over speeding in extravagant race cars, and then worse, being caught inebriated at the same time - with an admitted mix of three different classes of intoxicant in his system.

Let's get one thing straight - yes, there is a degree of responsibility that comes with millions of kids buying all of your merchandise and thereby making you rich beyond their wildest dreams while you are still a teenager. But - does that mean your life belongs to them and you must consider them before any move you make? Well, no, but get ready for one severe backlash if you suddenly turn out to be a very different person from the one plastered all over the world by your marketing team.

It is a lot of weight for a young star to carry and it seems almost universal (LiLo, ol' Britney, Miley, the Biebs etc.) that former child stars rebel against their childish selves when the hormones kick in and they want to be taken more seriously either as artists or as individuals, or both. Eventually some of the darker side shows itself, and the media are there with a desert-dry sponge ready to mop it all up and then drip it back out onto the world's stage for all to see. You know, growing up can be very hard for any teenager, but having to do it publicly with every single bad choice replayed daily sure can hurt someone, and probably haunt them at night.

For all our knee jerk reactions that it's a disgrace, look how much money he/she has, and all the fans that are devastated by their hero taking drugs and being arrested and so on, well, how many of us would truly want to be in their shoes and facing adolescence in a fishbowl with almost 50 million followers on Twitter alone?! When we did something wrong as kids, all we wanted to do was shrink up into a ball and hide from everyone, remember? And everyone was like maybe 10 people for us! Being followed around everywhere and provoked into reactions that are later regretted doesn't help either. It's too much worship and associated responsibility for any youngster, methinks.

I am not taking the Biebs side, I am simply looking at both sides. He made his choices and followed his dreams, and unlike most he already realised those dreams, even if on a bad day they more closely resemble nightmares. But they sure are nightmares primarily of his own making, and if he now wants to act out and be seen to be all grown up, well with that comes consequences and being held accountable. But don't forget a point I made in one of my Morrissey blogs about the media-savvy young stars who get into just enough trouble to ensure high visibility but never enough to stop the party.

The Biebs seems to be on one of those rolls, given the various incidents he's been involved in of late, often involving partying and fast cars. Most recently there has been much talk of interventions and the like, with the flying in of mentor Usher and manager Scooter Braun to Panama seen as a sure sign they were gonna drag him out in the night to a waiting limo to be ushered (sorry!) directly off to rehab. Apparently not. 

It says something that Bieber's uber-successful manager is barely over 30 himself, and it seems totally unbeliebable even today, that the Biebs only entered the planet in 1994 - so pervasive has his young existence been. But has anyone wondered if a great deal of his recent "crisis" is manufactured bad behaviour? A previously nice guy teen heartthrob who is not only growing tired of being an angel, but who is wondering who he wants to be, as an artist, by the time he is say, 25? Serious worries for your typical 19-year-old been-there-done-that megastar! Additionally, management/marketing may even be manipulating the situation, because the more the world is talking about the Biebs, the more the cash registers are ringing.

My overall take on it? You only have to look at the Biebs today to see either a young Eminem, or a wannabe hip black rap legend, and we'll choose a 50 Cent as one example. The Biebs struts around in chains, with his jeans hanging off his thighs, branded underwear at his waist, the requisite tattoos on his body, plus a healthy dose of swagger, fast cars, intoxicants and now even some arrests thrown into the mix. He is getting ready to ditch the sugary sweet pop persona and wants to be a credible pseudo-bad boy rap/hip hop type of cool dude superstar.

The one missing part of that equation (until now) has been the credibility factor i.e. run-ins with the law - which almost every bad boy needs to have on his CV to be taken seriously. It seems to me that the Biebs is merely beefing up that CV (hopefully he has limits on how far he intends to go) and establishing his new self as more typical of a big city rebel teenager than his child star persona will allow. It could be quite calculated indeed, and maybe he's looking further forward than his loyal fans want or need him to; not least because he has been a rare example of someone straight (in the personality sense of the word!) making it big, and staying straight. An extremely rare case and yet an extremely refreshing one. 

Hence the pressure, and hence the public response to his apparent adolescence-in-public shenanigans of late. The big question of course is whether his gazillions of loyal fans (almost all of whom remain children today, legally) will remain with him, grow into adults with him, and instead of rejecting their teen idols as most do when they need to appear "cool" themselves, be able to transcend Bieber's transition into an entirely different style and musical genre; he wants to be an adult superstar and not an ex-teen heartthrob. 

It could end up being a very smart move for someone who may have hit his own end-of-the-road or crossroads with the entire phenomenon known as "Justin Bieber". He will surely lose some people, but may build a more varied audience further down the line. On the other hand, he may be gambling with the affections of a massive audience who have heretofore been very faithful to him, and this new bad boy could be taken as a slap in the face to those who put him where he is today, and they might walk. 

It's a big gamble, and who knows which way the pendulum will swing. If I am wrong about all of this, and he really is spinning out of control in a way that has not been calculated in advance by his management, well then we are probably watching a slow motion trainwreck-in-the-making with an ending that is all too inevitable. You know, he's still only a teenager and the one thing that seems to be a lot less present these days is a very important factor still, or should be - his mom. She seems to have evaporated from his support system, and right now it seems that he could use being sat down at the kitchen table and given the kind of talk that only a mom can do!

You know, my teenage days are a long, long way behind me, and yet my mom expects me to call her at least twice a week to tell her what I am up to and what's going on in my life! It doesn't matter what age you are, as a boy, your mom will always be your mom and she always knows best, even if we pretend to disagree. It keeps us grounded. No matter what age you are, when your mom gets you onto the scales to check your weight and make sure you are eating enough, well, that's your mom. On that note, I am due on the scales in a couple of weeks so I am off now to eat some prime rib and a mountain of roast potatoes! - Kevin Mc ;)

The importance of (not) being Morrissey! [Part III]

  

Ah yes, pop figures, tis true - I indeed implied the existence of a three-part emissary on all things Mozness, and it was not a miserable lie. Au contraire, chums, and here we are again on the crazy, draizey train (make that the gravy train!) that was 80s alternative music - Manchester style. 

Ol' Doc Morrissey is having a smashing kick-off to 2014, what with his autobiography riding high on serial put-downs, and now the announcement that he is back in the saddle once again, so to speak, with a spanking new two-record deal inked with prestigious Capitol Records of Hollywood. Not a bad start to the new year at all, and one can just picture the handsome devil prancing around his country estate with armfuls of gladioli, singing "Oops, I did it again" by our Britney!

The book is actually a very stimulating read, though one does tend to get bogged down a little by all the Frank McCourt-like elaboration on the poverty and hopelessness of life in those times, notwithstanding the fact that Manchester was not the Ireland of McCourt's upbringing. It was almost inevitable that Moz would paint a purposefully wrinkled canvas and weave an image-rich tapestry of an almost other-worldly dystopian Manchester; one that made the word "bleak" seem all warm and cosy in comparison. As fun as that is, my dear boy (Mr. M), I can quite guarantee you that we have all flicked forward several pages at a time to see when we were getting to sink our teeth into the meat of the matter - Der Smythes. 

Along with the head of Elton John on a plate, this would also be a case of meat not being murder, apart maybe from the fact that Morrissey chopped up the meat of the band and spat it back out lifeless one hell of a long time ago. But the point is - the great majority of us loafing oafs (i.e. not who Moz wrote the book for) bought the book almost exclusively to hear about bigmouth's take on the entire Smythes affair - start to finish. Eventually, and sure enough, bigmouth indeed strikes again! 

It takes some 145 pages to get to the mythic meeting of the big M&M, and even when it does, it's related in a somewhat disappointing but totally realistic fashion of how such things actually happen - i.e. there's no lightning bolt that hit Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall as His Miz and Mr. Marr shook hands - and you can't help but wonder if they ever did. Shake hands, that is. 

Oh, I have a sudden flashback of a scary character in Alan Bleasdale's brilliant "Boys from the Blackstuff", who used to walk up to young men in pubs and demand that they "shake hands". It was always a total treat to see the hard men crumble to the ground, as "Shake Hands" shook them to within an inch of their lives. Hilarious! It's highly likely that Morrissey won't mind this interjection because it's precisely the kind of indisputably British working class TV production that he seems to remember fondly - and furthermore it was shown the very same year the lads got together: 1982. 

Not to be confused with "that other 1982" which also ironically happens to be stamped with the Penguin logo, but is such a staggeringly inconsequential '82 in comparison that it will not in any way be associated with the musical cold fusion that was Morrissey and Marr; that was a spectacularly explosive synthesis of quite nuclear proportions. At the risk of being pilloried for a Moz-like nonchalance, need I also point out that one is published on the Penguin Classics imprint, and the other isn't? ;)

Trophy time? Again? Alrighty, I can oblige a second time, pop figures! It says something that a mere month from seeing Der Smythes at Westfield College in God-knows-where Square, that our next meeting was to be held in the much more prestigious and significantly more cavernous confines of the legendary Electric Ballroom in good old Camden Town. This venue is right next door to the Camden Town tube station and although perennially under threat of closure, I believe it has had a few reprieves and the doors still open to this day. As you can see, prices had risen steeply inside a mere month also, from two to three pounds to see them! Shocking, if only because it also restates how long ago we must be talking about! But this was another landmark early ('83) show by the band, commenced by Morrissey bounding on stage with a greeting of "Hello, chums!" to the many (new) faithful.

One of the reasons I have such fond memories of that show was that it was the only time I can remember hearing the divine "Accept Yourself" live. Unusually, at the first encore, Moz asked for suggestions, and there was this guy beside us who was about to burst a blood vessel screaming out the name of the song. It seemed so unlikely a choice and yet I had never heard it live myself, so I joined in, albeit in a less apoplectic fashion! I cannot believe that he could possibly have been heard above the fracas, but in a case of truly divine intervention, he got his wish. And I got mine. It was a great show, even if it felt a tad diluted in the prematurely large venue for a band still being seen in close proximity most of the time, and lest we forget, a band that had not yet released any album. Yes, my dear Smithsonians, all of this was before the technically flawed but artistically rich debut "The Smiths" was released, which was probably a very good thing!

Why? Well, because it allowed us insiders to hear these songs performed how they were intended to be heard, which was a Godsend because the studio versions of those songs were a sad misrepresentation of their live selves at the hands of one John Porter, whose muted, muddled, muddied and mangled recordings/mixes of them was nothing short of a disgrace; or that's how it felt to those of us in the know, us who had seen the live fire being reduced to nothing but a few bright sparks. 

I had never heard what Morrissey's opinions on the debut fiasco were, and it was gratifying to read that we are in almost total agreement on it, as clarified by his comments on various songs. Porter committed many a sin on that record, perhaps the biggest of which (for me) was on a live favourite, the peerless "I Don't Owe You Anything". Live, it was all staccato guitar chords and punctuational drumbeats, overlaid by an aching, poignant and classic Morrissey lyric/vocal - irresistible if only by nature of it's relative tenderness and musical restraint, and the contemplative effect it seemed to have on us all. 

"Too freely on your lips, words prematurely sad, oh  but I know what will make you smile tonight...
  Life is never kind, life is never kind, oh but I know what will make you smile tonight..."

The recorded version of this live showstopper was reminiscent of one of those jazz/country husband and wife duos playing weddings at the local hotel or doing karaoke versions of the old classics unnoticed in the local pub on a Sunday night, beside the dartboard. The song has this morose, coma-inducing keyboard playing that quite literally sucked out whatever life it had in it upon entering the studio to such an extent that someone should have told John Porter that "I don't owe you anything" - for destroying it. 

As far as I am aware, Mr. Porter was never charged for his crimes, but in line with Morrissey's distaste for great miscarriages of justice, perhaps he could persuade the High Court to put Porter into the stocks outside Rough Trade Records, and allow the public to vent their displeasure via the time-proven punishment of rotten eggs? Morrissey would approve, I am quite sure, especially if his Lordship, Maxwell Carrington QC, would deem it necessary to put Geoff Travis into the stocks alongside Porter so that they could pay together!

But you know? At the risk of committing Smithsonian heresy, and perhaps even incurring the wrath of His Mizzery, it is my humble opinion that no one truly understood how to capture the phenomenon that was The Smiths live, in the studio.  I can hear the screams and howls of disapproval, but I remain firmly in the belief that they rarely transcended the sterility and mechanics of the studio and got to the place where the songs got to, live. This problem was less evident on later records, but I personally feel that they still may not have recorded their best record.

Somewhat ironically, for they were not a classical stadium band by any means, I feel that The Smiths were too big for the confines of a recording studio. They were caged animals in the studio; Morrissey and Marr, at least, were designed to be able to stretch out and mark their territory, like the (musical) beasts they were, and they were meant to be in front of an audience of admirers. Studios just seemed to compress them, almost like taking their 16-track live sound and bouncing it back down to 4-track - details were lost.

Of course, this could be the curse of someone who saw them too many times, live, always pre-release for any given album, so all the songs had been heard in their live format beforehand. This is not always a good thing, and I am sure the same arguments come up for those who see a film before reading the book, as opposed to those who read the book first, and then see the film. There are inevitable shouting matches about which is best.

Anyway, there are rare examples of where it was captured perfectly, and my rather shocking example of that would be the sublime "This Night Has Opened My Eyes". A magnificent distillation of who and what they were, but perhaps shocking in that it is hardly one of their better known songs, and additionally it was not recorded on any official Smiths album. As far as I can remember, it was laid down at the BBC for a John Peel session, and I was one of very few who actually had it. Imagine! A Smiths rarity captured late at night when most were asleep, and in those days there was no easy way to get it, but all that was ruined by the "Hatful of Hollow" compilation release which jumped on the money-spinning bandwagon and published my bejewelled rarities. Yes, I want Geoff Travis in those stocks also, Mr. Morrissey!

In any case, it was somewhat comforting to know that Morrissey also felt the same way as me about various studio recordings, as outlined in the book, but the music soon takes a back seat to being taken to court by Rourke and Joyce. Once Mozzer does get to the legal shenanigans between himself and the others. well, quite typically it takes up some 40 pages worth of his life. The put-downs come thick and fast, and are razor sharp in effect.

Although other writers are credited for being his major influences, it's undeniable that the ghost of Wilde has passed through Morrissey's hallways on regular occasions. Yes, he may have gotten his two line non-sequitur lyrical style from others, but the barbs, and the sharp points, the cutting edge and the out-and-out put-downs are pure Oscar Wilde. In many ways, Morrissey's entire autobiugraphy, or at least the part dealing with The Smiths, is in fact his very own De Profundis. Morrissey's gaol (prison) being in his case, well, himself. He is incarcerated by being himself, with himself, for all eternity, it seems.

Although Mike Joyce surely was no Lord Alfred Douglas to Morrissey's Wilde, I think most of us know that it's all about Johnny Marr; he was the lost lover to whom Morrissey gave his heart and soul, which was then cruelly wrenched from within, and it was the loss of Marr that ripped Morrissey's world apart, and that ultimately led to the legal battle with the other two Smiths. Morrissey's professional life is in many ways one big (occasionally twisted) love letter to Marr, and you can just sense the age and regret bubbling under the surface. He won't admit that of course, but you can see it behind the eyes, if you don't get distracted by what's coming out his mouth.

It's highly telling that Morrissey frequently refers to The Smiths as 'The Smiths', when it comes to discussion of anything pertaining to legal matters. Meaning, the world knew them as a four piece rock band comprising Moz, Marr, Rourle and Joyce, but in Morrissey's mind the entity for all legal and contractual purposes was only Morrissey&Marr. In the pop world one could collectively call them The Smiths, but when it came to who controlled the money then the entity was known as 'The Smiths' - i.e. not the real Smiths.

There was an interesting and telling song by a very under-the-radar 90s outfit known as Red Lemon, which I think I first heard at The Hand & Cradle, near Covent Garden, but although it was not well known it is widely believed to have been a take on the big man, during those times. I include some lyrics from the song for illustration:

" Commonwealth Hall, Cartwright Gardens

   Took me to the place

   Where I first saw, your face

   The one that would become

   The face of the Eighties

   The friend at hand, Square nowhere

    I was just no one

    But before that year was done

    I knew you were the one

    Face of the Eighties

    But nobody could have guessed

    That it was money

    Not your shoes, or friends

    With which you were concerned

    Face of the Eighties"   

Although it was (probably intentionally) rather vague, there was a lot of talk at the time about it being about Morrissey, and I think the line that clinches it is the reference to "...money, not your shoes or friends" - the apparently misplaced inclusion of "shoes" and its quite obvious juxtaposition beside "friends" is quite evidently invoking the big M, I'm afraid. You only have to listen to "Accept Yourself", where the singer introspectively examines (and/or suggests that one should) how he feels about his life, his past, and well, his shoes.  The money being more important than shoes or friends is something that at least half of The Smiths, if not three quarterss of them, would smile wryly at (today, perhaps) and, you know, being realistic, who else could have been The Face of the Eighties?!

And yet, for all the exposed slimy underbelly and the money-grabbing side of his personality that he hardly tries to hide, there remains an affection for and magnetism towards the man that is unshakable to this day. Arguably, he not only remains as popular today as he was in the 80s, but in fact is a bigger phenomenon who is subject to the adoration of millions around the globe. He somehow became a modern day Elvis or Lennon, adored by many for work he did decades ago, but simultaneously celebrated for idiosyncracies or eccentricities that set them apart in the first place but which continue to make the news today.

This inevitably leads to another type of bandwagon jumper - those already "blessed" with a degree (some degrees are bigger than others!) of celebrity who want to hitch their wagon to a legend like Morrissey, if only in a rather obvious attempt to add in some "cool" to their brand. The most unlikely or even incongruous sounding of such types is J.K. Rowling, prattling on about how important my Smiths were to her, and how the breaking up of the band affected her greatly - said while giggling at the same time. How come Harry Potter was not a Smiths fan, then?! Why wasn't there a "The Wiz" equivalent known as "The Moz" in the story? How come she hasn't used any of her billlions to get the lads to play a one-off reunion show at Hogwarts Castle, on the big outdoor stage? How come?!

It's so easy to do, in retrospect - "Yeah, I was a huge fan of Joy Division,  I have all their records!" - even though none are on vinyl, none are on cassette, and there are none of the seven or twelve-inch singles., which effectively dates their acquisition to, like, yesterday. You can just see ol' JK in a panic, after the filming of her fifiteen seconds of (musically cool) fame for "The Importance of being Morrissey", frantically racing around Virgin Records scooping up entire shelves labelled "Smiths". Well, no, make that screaming at a personal assistant down in London town from the tranquility of her country estate, "Go out and hoover up every single piece of music that was ever in any way associated with Les Miz, because I will be on tape for the whole world to see , they will see how cool I actually am, not just a studious old novelist, and we better have proof of that if the press comes-a-knocking. Let's go! Chop chop!"

The one great thing about having the trophies is that at least you can speak with some authority and conviction, because not only where you there, but you even have the proof that you were there! When I say that Morrissey strode onto the stage wearing nothing but a velvet tutu, an oversized pair of NHS spectacles, an NHS hearing aid stuck in one ear, and an armful of gladioli spilling over into the audience, well - you just know it has to be true, right? Right!

Once again, dear friends, I have overstayed my welcome and become rather verbose on one of my favourite subjects - Der Smythes. I will be forgiven in the fullness of time because my precious texts (at least in this case) will assume a degree of preciousness among the faithful, including those who never got the chance to experience Morrissey's heydays. I still remember various intro lines said from the stage as if it was yesterday. 

"Hello, chums!" 
"Hello, you cheery charmers!"
"We are The Smiths, how do you do?!" 
"Now then, this is our rec-kord, which is still buy-able: Hand-in-Glove."
"A song for the delicate, it's true, I don't owe you anything."
"This is your new anthem, if you but knew it: Reel Around the Fountain"

That I am able to expound at such length (and who knows, a Part IV may surface yet!) is in fact huge testament to the impact that The Smiths (and Morrissey specifically) had on my life, at a time when as 23-year-olds, he and I were both figuring out life. Without a nanosecond of hesitation, it was clear that he was way ahead of me both in articulating life and in actual achievements in life. But that's one reason why he was a star and I was not. But we all need inspiration and maybe even heroes, and this young lad from Mancunia who easily "could have been a poet or could have been a fool" very luckily (for us as well as him) became the former; or at least a modern day pop version of a poet.

For anyone who has never heard of him/them, you only need to listen to perhaps the greatest love song ever written for the pop canon - "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" - to hear The Smiths in all their glory. And I mean The Smiths, not 'The Smiths'. For that song alone, Morrissey et al. deserve to be remembered, but when you peruse their sadly shortened but massive contributions to alternative pop rock, well, in a weaker moment you might say that he deserves a knighthood. Even if he apparently would prefer to send in a construction crew to demolish Buckingham Palace than enter the grounds to accept some honour.

My mind brought me back to JK Rowling for some reason, and you know, in retrospect, I can remember standing beside a studious looking blond girl with big glasses at one of his shows, and she may even have had a hearing aid in place, and when I asked her what her favourite Morrissey line was, she didn't hesitate to say "There's more to life than books, you know, but not much more!" - oh my God, I was standing beside the mother of Harry Potter after all? This changes everything! Morrissey? Who? - Kevin Mc ;)

The importance of (not) being Morrissey! [Part II]

   

Here we are again, pop pickers, on the subject of ol' Morrissey Mullen himself, and if that was a typo we can make it Morrissey Sullen, which often seemed to be a more appropriate name for the lad. Don't get me wrong, there's absolutely nothing wrong with a bit of "attitude" in music, and God knows that today we are sorely missing it, and I don't mean the kind of attitude that surrounds kids like Justin Bieber, or the more senior Kanye West.

There was a glorious time in modern music where one could honestly say that the music spoke volumes, and was enough. One didn't need to see our favourite artist splattered over all the trashy magazines, nor on talk shows all the time, nor getting killer free publicity by being serially involved with the police due to various minor infractions. It's an art form in and of itself - get into just enough trouble to keep the paps clicking furiously, and your name in the "news" everyday, yet never enough trouble to get in the way of the partying.

There are many examples such as LiLo and now the Biebs, and I ain't going to give them any further free publicity nor reduce this blog to that level, but you get the point. Maybe it's a British thing, as opposed to an American thing, wherein a lot of our major artists seemed content to put their music out and let it be - pop speaks for itself?! At one time, Led Zeppelin were the biggest, baddest band on the planet, and yet you never saw any interviews nor the boys prancing onto a primetime talk show out of their heads. Why?

I find it a rather refreshing thought that a primetime rock star who gets adulation showered upon them 24/7 during a year-long world tour has had enough attention, and comes off the road wanting to hide at home, hang out with (real) friends, and stay the hell away from the media. As Percy Plant so modestly said in reference to the above point, "Well, I didn't really feel like we had anything else to say, we said it in our music", or something very close to that effect. For someone who admitted even to the "Godhead" syndrome of the touring rock star, I found that to be admirably restrained.

Whatever happened to some mystery, intrigue and the elusiveness of a famous yet very private famous artist? Peter Grant and the lads from Zep were unusually smart in that they knew that creating an aura of mystery and inaccessibility to the band only drew more and more people to them, and to their live performances. Fast forward to today, and stars all have their own website, Facebook page, Twitter account and are pushed harder than ever by publicity/media reps of record companies to sell-sell-sell themselves all the time, even (especially?) when off the road.

How many celebrity embarrassments have we had in recent times, on Twitter in particular? Can you truly expect 20-somethings with way too much money, way too much fame, and way too much free time, to not post something outrageous at 3am after a big night of partying? It's almost a given, and many have fallen prey to the temptation to talk to "my peeps", because they are all sitting up at home, lonely and miserable, and they need to hear from me! Uh huh.

Although Morrissey was so voraciously pursued by the media at various points during The Smiths rise that he did pop up here or there from time to time, he definitely was aloof or above it all, and cleverly used various media situations to his advantage by promoting his personal passions and causes. But by and large he did maintain his aura of mystery, if not secrecy, and this is very much a positive. He has been around for a hundred years now, yet we still only know so much about him, and you can't help but feel there are all sorts of vaults still to be penetrated. By the eyes, by the ears - behaaaave, people!

One aspect that he covered very well was his appetite for the cash that came with the job. Very much was made of his humble upbringing and roots, but his desire for (musical) fame was pretty much always observed to have been an artistic hunger, not greed for the spoils of war. He himself seemed very content with the former image - yet if you believe what was written by Johnny Rogan (among others) in his book "Morrissey and Marr: The Severed Alliance" - well, you see a very different side to the man and his story.

I am all for major talent getting its just desserts, but I understand less the fact that from very early on, the two "worker smiths" were being royally screwed by the organisation known at "The Smiths" (read, The Smiths Inc.), if not by the actual individuals (friends?) themselves. It's all very well claiming that this happened only later on when cracks began to show in the Smiths family, or that when the amount of money became huge, that's when greed set in - but if you believe the story, then the separation of bass player Andy Rourke and drummer Mike Joyce from the money began at the signing of their very first record contract with Rough Trade - both were excluded from signatures i.e. they were not legally members of The Smiths; they were merely hired hands of the band (which thus was only Morrissey and Marr). 

Much has been made of this, but that it is factually correct has been underlined by legal action taken by both Rourke and Joyce in later years. It took the matter to get to the High Court for all the dirt to come out, and for all to see how truly unequal, uncollegial and unpleasant was the alliance (collective might be a better word) known as The Smiths. It became clear that as far as that entity was concerned, Rourke and Joyce were "mere session musicians, as replaceable as the parts in a lawnmower", and someone claiming that Morrissey said precisely that would not have trouble convincing anyone - as it sounds like a classic Mozzer put-down.

M&M (hmm, sounds sweeter than it was in this combination!) quite naturally shared all publishing royalties arising out of their songs, and no one disputed that. What was at issue was the sharing of all the other income that arose from record sales, touring, merchandising etc. Now, given that the duo were raking in a truckload as it was, from the songwriting, one would readily imagine that the rest was shared equally. Not so. It turned out that all other income was funnelled into a vessel known as "Smithdom Ltd.", and the breakdown there was that the worker smiths would share in only 20% of the pot. M&M took a healthy 40%, each.

This might appear shocking in and of itself, but the part I find incredibly shocking is that Mike Joyce only found that out after the band broke up in 1987, when talking to his accountant! I agree that this was a staggering oversight on his part, due to his belief in M&M and their friendship/partnership, but it was an oversight born out of true business naivete that Morrissey (if not both M&M) clearly took advantage of. So, M&M took 100% of all songwriting-related monies, and 80% of everything else - does that seem fair to you?

Therein lies a much more difficult set of questions to answer, and a lot of it is subjective, because how can you guage the contribution of a drummer to the overall success of a group? There are no rules or guidelines to follow or legal criteria to judge it on. How critical was Ringo Starr to the success of The Beatles - did he deserve a quarter share, or way less? What about the (convenient, perhaps) claim by Noel Gallagher (Oasis) that no drum part or bassline ever made one of his songs better, so why should someone get paid extra for it? Ol' Moz was/is clearly in agreement with that philosophy, even if in his book, he gets a dig in at Noel about his songwriting!

It all comes down to what legally-binding deal is struck at the beginning, and I guess, whether the typical four members of a band are actual friends, or not.  The best way around this problem is to do what U2 did from the start - four lads against the world - and split everything (in their case that includes songwriting, I believe) into four. These guys are Irish also, to boot, so any mumblings about Moz still remembering stories of the potato famine and the abject poor struggling for survival during bleak periods in Irish history, as causes for his fever over money, well, they just don't hold water. It's not background nor nationality-based, it's personal.

But it raises an excellent question - would one say that the contributions of Adam Clayton (bass) and Larry Mullen Jr. (drums) to U2 songs is significantly greater than Rourke/Joyce to Smiths songs? Without knowing the inner workings of each musical outfit it is hard to be definitive, but as a judgement call, I would say no. Mullen is a better drummer than Joyce, but Rourke is much more a virtuoso bass player than Clayton, who I also happen to enjoy by the way.

To go back to Noel's point, I actually disagree - somewhat. Without doubt, Andy Rourke produced basslines that did change, and did improve, and did make various Smiths songs. Where would I start, to illustrate? This Charming Man, This Night Has Opened My Eyes, Rusholme Ruffians, There Is A Light That Never Goes Out, and on and on. Some of those basslines I can hear in my head today sitting at this desk, so they clearly are an integral part of those songs. The problem is in quantifying it, and that's almost impossible. Additionally, not every listener hears the bassline at all, whereas I tend to go digging for it even if it's less than obvious.

But you know, I said it was important, and I was not wrong. In an interview where this entire situation came to light, Johnny Marr admitted that Andy Rourke had made an incredible contribution to Smiths songs, and claimed that he was willing to pull out his cheque book and write Andy a cheque for an unspecificed amount. Morrissey reputedly did not agree to match that amount, as expected, which blocked the settlement. It remains unclear to me (to many) to this day whether Mozzer truly was the evil financial maestro that even Johnny has implied him to be, or whether Johnny knew Moz was like that, and simply turned a blind eye to Moz funnelling the great majority of all monies into their two sets of hands.

It is clear that none of these rather affable lads from Manchester were business-minded (who would be at their tender age at that time) and maybe they were all so caught up in being in a famous band, with "trusted" pals, that no one was worrying about money? All except one, at any rate. Then when the band broke up, so did the income dry up, and then friends and family saw M&M still living the highlife, while the two worker smiths went back to being broke.

It must take some arrogance and selfishness to see a friend and co-member of a band you were in, broke and unhappy, afterwards, and you flush with cash, knowing you squeezed the beast dry and left them the drippings. And then when the ghost of the beast rears its ugly head and comes back to haunt you, rather than settling - which would be a de facto admission of some guilt -you point blank refuse to give them a penny. From pal and fellow band-member-against- the-world, to cold-hearted selfish businessman - in a heartbeat.  

As it turned out, just prior to Joyve taking The Smiths to the High Court, Rourke (who was in debt, i.e. desperate) settled with M&M for a reputed 83,000 GBP and 10% of future royalties. That Andy was a nice guy and got taken advantage of, again, became apparent when Joyce won his case, and the judge ordered Morrissey to pay him a massive one million GBP (plus 25% of future royalties), and remember, that was back in the mid-90s! This shows you just how much money was at stake, and the fact that this amount could be considered as another band member's own slice underlined how much cash M&M were sitting on, while their "friends" were on the breadline.

Morrisey took this matter and his venom to the Court of Appeals. and lost again. I even heard something about him wanting the House of Lords in the UK to overthrow the judgement, which many simply scoff at. I don't doubt that Joyce has gone to town since the verdict and has done his best to file as many legal documents as needed to ensure that payments continued as scheduled, and at one point at least he actually had successfully placed a hold on all Mozzers's income and assets in the UK. One can only imagine the fire and brimstone this raised in Moz's loins, err, no, make that his wallet - something which seems very close to his heart. When you hear what he did say of Joyce, it's really rather hard to see any humanity in Morrissey at all:

"It was a terrible miscarriage of justice. I wish the very, very worst for Joyce, for the rest of his life."

It's a sad and sickly story, and one that should never have happened. Poor Andy Rourke didn't stick with it, and boy did he get screwed a second time. Imagine even $83,000 in comparison to $1M? And we are talking British pounds here! Sadly for Andy, and very cleverly for M&M, they got him to waive all future claims in return for his small settlement. It was Joyce who indeed had the last laugh, causing such fury in his former hero that he has even been heard in live shows as a solo artist encouraging the audience to not buy any of Johnny's remastered Smiths CDs -because it only puts more money into the hands of that "wretched drummer".

In the famous words of the man himself - "And heaven knows I'm miserable now...."  - Kevin Mc


The importance of (not) being Morrissey! [Part I]

   

It's no coincidence at all that more than one person gave me a certain book at Christmas - we're talking about the long-awaited autobiography of former Smiths singer/songwriter, Morrissey - because I have been a lifelong fan of the man and his music. His book has been published by the estimable Penguin Classics imprint which is hardly uncontroversial given that such an honour is normally reserved for better established masters of the written word, who often also happen to be dead!

But then again, it is Morrissey, and so a little controversy is almost a given along the way, even if some of it came late in the game, just prior to publication in fact, when Morrissey ran into a dispute over content and even announced that he was looking for another publisher. In the end, things were sorted out and the book is now available in both hardback and paperback here in North America. 

I have not finished it yet, so I am not in a position to give a definitive review but it is pretty much what anyone who knew anything about him would have expected, more or less. Depending on which camp one is in, Morrissey is either a fascinating character or an incredibly self-indulgent self-obsessed one. But wasn't it Madonna who said that anyone who wants to stand up on a stage in front of thousands of salivating fans just has to be screwed up?!

My own love affair with the Smiths was heavily driven by the music and the times, but I was somewhat surprised to find that I had more in common with the man than I anticipated. We are both Irish and Catholic so that alone says a lot (!), but we grew up in the same times, albeit he in the wastelands of Manchester and I in a small town in Ireland near Belfast - but there is one aspect of our young lives that we appeared to have equal disdain for - our daily prison, school, and the collective misery of both the inmates as well as the jailers themselves. 

I feel pretty much identically to everything Mozzer says about the school system of those times. It was anything but a supposed educational experience, and the violence inflicted not only by the brutal headmaster but also by a handful of his similar-minded hired thugs meant that some entirely inappropriate messages were beaten into unsuspecting boys. Big Frank's towering presence would tear into the sea of children in morning assembly, causing the two sides of the ocean to unzip perfectly, like the Red Sea parting, leading the way to the target, who would then be beaten to the ground. Probably for smiling at someone beside them.

I used to look at that cowardly bully, even while not yet a teenager myself, and wonder if that was supposed to be the "man" that we were expected to grow up into - a six-foot-plus fully grown humanoid who took out his daily frustrations on tiny pre-pubescent schoolboys. Frank simply underlined the point that he and his gang of hired thugs were excuses for teachers, unwittingly exposing the almost certain fact that they were all people who had failed to get any further in life - those who can, do, and those who can't - teach! The one instructional lesson I did learn was that I was not going to make their mistakes, and end up in such a prison with any of them, for the rest of my life. I suppose that made the seven year misery worthwhile?!

"Belligerent ghouls, run Manchester schools, spineless swine, cemented minds.....belligerent ghouls, run Manchester schools, spineless bastards all!" - [The Headmaster Ritual]

But like his Mozness, I too escaped into the world of TV and music, and my wild imagination. But I also had science and chemistry to make life worth living, which explains why I liked shows such as "Lost in Space". However, I was floored to read in the book that Moz had also been a fan of this show, even if he disappointed me by not mentioning one of my favourite characters, the amazing robot! This robot was a Class M-3 B9 model, and I loved it so much I am showing it below, not least because it also made a prior appearance in my own story, THE MOLECULES,  currently available on Kindle. 

                                                               

It's interesting of course that my take on the show was all about the space and sci-fi adventure, as well as the antics of the deliciously evil nemesis, Dr. Zachary Smith, while Morrissey was fascinated with the gender stereotyping in the show, which I probably barely noticed, not least as I didn't have any gender or sexuality issues. Another thing that truly surprised me was that Morrissey was not an only child; au contraire, he came from a typically rather large extended family; somehow I had envisaged a lonely boy with no siblings or cousins or aunts/uncles to bring him out of himself, and the obsession with self was the result. Apparently not!

Of course, he is best known for the staggering musical contribution he made to the entire music scene via seminal 80's outfit, The Smiths. His songwriting partnership with Johnny Marr would become a tour de force often spoken of in terms usually reserved for the likes of Lennon-McCartney, Jagger-Richards,  Page-Plant or even Strummer-Jones. Notwithstanding Morrissey's considerable success as a solo artist, I don't think anyone would argue that when you separate songwriting powerhouses such as Morrissey-Marr, well, things are never the same again. As much as I loved The Smiths, I cannot help but feel that the world lost out - who knows what amazing albums were to come had the lads stuck it out?

I can see that (as usual!) I have way more to say on the subject than fits into one blog (or keeps your attention from wandering!), so I better reserve further comments for another blog on this subject. But I do have a trophy, and one that I thought I would share: some of us have to argue forcefully that we loved this band or that band, back in the day, before they were known, but this boy doesn't need to do that - he has the proof!

In the photo on the right above, you can see the ticket for my first ever Smiths show, and in case it's not clear enough on that old ticket, I can inform you that the date says "Thursday 17th November, 1983" - and I guess that ages both myself and Mr. Morrissey! But as I said to someone the other day, if having seen The Smiths (or New Order, or Felt, etc.) live more than a dozen times (in their heyday) makes me old - well, that's something that is a small price to pay for having been present and witnessing such early greatness. Even if the date has faded over time, check out the price of the ticket, people - a support band, followed by The Smiths, for, wait for it - TWO pounds?! That alone probably gives the date away! ;)

The Smiths were late for soundcheck that dreary Thursday night, and a small group of us stood outside in the chilly rain, waiting to be allowed to enter the Westfield College hall. But it was all worth it, and seeing them bound onstage and Morrissey tossing an armful of his beloved gladioli onto the heads of those at the front was an announcement that something special was coming. I was blown away not only by the originality of the material but also by how rock solid tight they were, like a well-oiled musical machine, already! I doubt there was even a hundred people in the room. 

I turned to a pal beside me a few songs in, and said "Boy, these guys are gonna be huge. Trust me!" - famous last words or what?! But you know, I was never one of those people who longed to be the celebrity up there on the stage, unless it was truly me doing it my own way. Much as I admired the man and his music, it could never have felt the same had it been me up there; instead I got to be one of those truly cool people (!) whose life was changed by the music of some unknown group and I got to have a precious well kept secret. 

Given how big they became it's hard to imagine or remember that, in a city as huge as London with so many big name music venues, we had to traipse off to Westfield College in the middle of nowhere to see them. I don't even think that college exists anymore, as it was merged into Queen Mary College. A total contrast for even Morrissey himself I am sure, in that mere months later he got to stand on the stage of the grand old Lyceum Theatre on The Strand in front of many more people who had paid to see him. Ironically, even though it had been a dream of his, the show was cut short as Moz explained that he was not feeling well to a disappointed audience, but quite fittingly they ended with a new song entitled "Still Ill" - which would later become one of their classics. 

For an all too brief period, Morrissey and The Smiths were ours - until the world started to listen. But as I alluded to earlier, one has to be not only gifted, but also, well, "alternative", to be someone like Morrissey, and as great as the musical catalogue undoubtedly is, the man himself remains misunderstood, elusive, aloof and somewhat a caricature of himself - some of the aspects that contributed to his unique cool when younger now appear to be twisted or distorted into themselves, today leaving an impression of meanness and some degree of never-erased dissatisfaction or even actual unhappiness. 

It's not what one would expect of someone who achieved and continues to achieve so much. But art and life are not necessarily the best bedfellows, and one can be extraordinarily good at one, or the other, but not always both. So, sometimes it's a magnificent thing to be able to appreciate the art of the master, without having to live the life from which that art derives. So while this blog and the others to come on the subject are an homage to the man, I will close with a play-on-words (using the title of a Chrysalis TV documentary on him) and underline the equal importance of not being Morrissey! ;) - Kevin Mc

Think before you do that tat - stat - you're not Kat!

It's 2014, people, and it seems that the trend of putting ink (art, in some cases, and depending on your opinion!) on one's body is as in vogue as ever, even to the extent of seemingly very conservative (as in, old?!) types giving in to the urge or need to join the club. I find it a quite fascinating conundrum, and I can sort of understand how some older types apparently agonise over the big "Should I, or shouldn't I" - but I only said "sort of"!
 

Don't get me wrong. On the "right" person, it "works". In the good old days, the "right" person was a sailor, and seeing an anchor on the forearm of a crusty old salt still makes great sense today, even if they are senior citizens. In more recent times, tattoos have been more heavily associated with rock stars and other forms of rebel celebrities. In case it needs clarification, the term "rebel" simply means those who rebelled against or were simply lucky enough to have escaped the mind-numbing conservatism of a typical nine-to-five office-bound life. Society bound and ruled, like the most of us are.

The rules are different for those who get paid to be and look different, but for the rest of the world and certainly in the business world, well, there has always been a negative stigma associated with anyone who has a hulking great dragon showing through their designer shirt or blouse. There is a wildness inherently implied by a supposedly "normal" person sporting something so adventurous, and it can most definitely change how one is perceived by others in the workplace. You can just hear the stiffly starched CEO asking his secretary "Do you think she has a drug problem?"

 

Such issues are not an issue for those free of the barbed wire of societal mores, such as superstar tattoo artiste and all-round great gal, Kat Von D, pictured above. In many ways, tattoos are not that different from clothes, with the exception that clothes can get pulled off in an instant. But just like our clothes, they are a form of personal expression, and additionally, when it works it works, and when it doesn't, well, it simply doesn't. Kat somehow manages to make it all work and still come across as impossibly glamorous - the question is, why?! Or, how? It's a rather simple answer actually - because it is real, it is her, and it is a bold and clear statement of who she truly is.
 

I cannot help but feel that tattoos are like leather pants or bright Ferrari-red hair: they can look fantastic on the "right" person, and totally out of place on the "wrong" person.  Don't get me wrong, dear friends, I am not in any way criticising any individual's right to choose, but you know what I mean. Seeing a 19-year-old tattooed gal heading out to a club or a 26-year-old musician strutting around town in tight leather pants apparently fits, but seeing your middle-aged dad wearing his old leather pants to go see geriatric rockers (e.g. The Rolling Stones ;) reunited once again, sort of doesn't!

That's why we have mirrors in changing rooms. We can try on all sorts of mini-adventures on ourselves, stare in horror at the sight reflecting back at us or even fall down laughing at the mere concept of being seen out in public like that. The point being that it's a very transient adventure; one that can be ripped off with lightning speed before someone we know shows up in the same store. Tattoos, however, are a lot more permanent. Notwithstanding of course the arrival of "cover-up" tattoos onto the scene; yet that burgeoning trend is in and of itself a sure sign of the regret that can build up and seep through the form of what was once a "tattoo for life!"
 

You see, Dad can still pull those leather pants off and throw them into the closet where they probably belong. But Mum can't do very much to hide that tramp stamp ( a hideously over-indulged tattoo trend that truly ages a generation of even rather young women today) other than cover it up! This is what most people don't consider when putting ink on themselves - a lot of the trends that are red-hot today, actually age you ten years down the line - the total opposite of the "cool" they (maybe) once gave you. Honestly, most of those people with an armband of some description or other around one entire upper arm look the total opposite of what the idea was; today it's more old and uncool as opposed to young and hip.

Kids should look at even their own parents, and see how they react to seeing old pics of themselves in high school, college, when first married, etc. The most striking thing is almost universally, how ridiculous the hair and pants look! And funnily enough, that's quite normal. Fashion changes quite drastically during a single lifetime, but the beauty of fashion is that we simply discard it and move on. Ditto the haircuts and styles. But you can't really do that with a tat, and if it's permanently exposed on you - well, you surely are branded with it! In many ways, the more the pair of pants or tattoo is directly linkable to a certain trend of period of time, the more it will age you if you are still wearing it 10-20 years later. Think!

 

Now don't get me wrong, again - if you are very creative and insist on not only having very original artsy designs done (i.e. not potentially dating yourself by following trends), but are also smart enough to locate them where they may only show, say, in a swimsuit or sportswear setting, but can't be seen in business attire - that's very savvy. Like it or not, while the business world has shifted to more casual attire, I am not sure that tattoos (especially multiples thereof) are seen the same way.
 

For younger kids, I think it's important to find out what and who they are going to be, before they start to define their image simply by being adorned in ink. And lest we forget - it does appear to be quite addictive, like piercing. Once you start, feel the sting, get the endorphin rush, you just wanna go back for more, more, more! It's maybe a bit like smoking or any other drug - as long as you don't start, you can't get addicted. But if you dive in, well, you're in and may end up in the deep end. If people could just settle for having one killer defining and distinctive tattoo there would be no discussion, but it seems one is rarely enough.
 

The ideal age for tattoos might be somewhere between 20 and 30, if people have to do it. Old enough where no one can stop you, and you have begun to figure out who you are going to be in life, perhaps. As to the new trend of those who are already 40-ish suddenly waking up into an inkwell of mid-life crisis, and going out and getting something wild put onto their forearm or the small of their back - I guess I just don't get it. It's as if they don't feel unique enough or differentiated enough, and see young people doing it, and it''s maybe the cheaper version of going out at 55 and buying the Porsche and racing around town in it with the top down?!
 

But while it's one thing to see a 19-year-old strutting around with their new tattoo, it's quite another to see it on someone considerably older. Rarely does it look that good, and even more rarely does it seem to "work" or fit. It's some form of identity mid-life crisis, requiring a form of expression not previously deemed acceptable, or as if one finally realised that haircut and clothes and car (and, God forbid, mere personality!) are simply not enough to let the world know who you are. Even if one shouldn't really care about that, if one is all grown up. However, there's something a lot more "attention-seeking" in a clear-skinned 40-something suddenly showing up at work with the proverbial skull and crossbones.

As conversation-inducing as tattoos are, the one thing most seem to agree on is how not-so-good they look on old, sagging skin. You can't help but feel that some of these people are going to look truly weird, at 65 or 70, covered in ink and designs, but with the wrinkles distorting the supposed message, and them dressed in their Walgreen's ad pants and unable to remember where they got that tattoo done or why. Or, ironically, it setting them apart socially even at that age, and their peers not wanting to hang out with that guy. He's weird!
 

I suppose it all comes down to those who live in and for the moment, and never think of ever being that age - "hope I die before I get old" - and those who see a bigger picture and worry more about what they will look like or who they will appear to be - even some twenty years hence. It's not that different from smoking, for example. Some refuse to do it or quit because they want to be healthy and alive later in life, while others shrug and say "Who cares if I am sick in thirty years time, I will be old anyway!" - but of course, at some point or another, we almost all begin to look at that classic hope-I-die-before-I-get-old line in a new light. That includes Pete Townsend and Roger Daltrey, I am pretty sure!

 

I don't mean to be sanctimonious because maybe it's me who is an old conservative fuddy-duddy, after all. The bottom line is - those who love tattoo art and use it as a form of self-expression will do so and good luck to them! But, for those who really are scared of it or worry about how it will impact their lives, but feel peer pressure to do it - I say, look inside of yourself and see everything that you have and are, which, combined with your personal sense of style and your various passions in life can make way more of an imprint on other people's lives than some imprint on your arm will make on yours! If tattoos are not your thing, find another way of expressing your uniqueness and your brand message!

 
Now then, I feel my very own mini-identity crisis coming on, and I am off to the back of the closet to see if that black Smith's T-shirt with the blue logo and the sideways face in grey is still in there and if it still fits me - that's my idea of one killer body tattoo! That comes from the Meat is Murder tour at the Royal Albert Hall in London, and even if that ages me a bit, like some ancient tattoo, well I guess it's still so cool that I simply don't care! Maybe that's the point, and I have more in common with the tattoo gang after all?! Oh my God, I am off out to get "This Charming Man" writ large across my chest, y'all! ;) - Kevin Mc

Today has had a lot of cosmetic surgery - but they need to exchange the scalpel for a Gillette blade!

One great thing about the Christmas hols is the fact that we are not slaves to our alarm clocks (i.e. us normal folk who don't have the amazing clinically proven Philips wake-up light, like our own Miss Crissy C!) and we get to lie in bed and exclaim "Ah, time for my news" just as the Today show is about to start. Instead of having to race out into the cold towards the shower, we get to lie back waiting to hear the news of the day.

I have been on an almost year-long hiatus from the show, so I was quite intrigued to see how many of my suggested changes were implemented by NBC, and what was shaking on this historically money printing but recently withering news franchise. Well, to be honest (and we always say what we think on the EU blog ;), from what I saw this morning, jumping out of bed into the cold no longer seems to be the worst option! 

This show has been in freefall for over a year now, as documented on this blog, and totally irrespective of the facelift that the show has clearly been given, it has become as irrelevant as I can possibly remember it ever being. Sometimes when you try too hard, and try too hard to be "hip" and "cool", you just show your age in all of the overreaching. Matt and Savannah are alright, but associating the word "cool" with their brands is pure oxymoron. People who bring us serious news at 7am aren't supposed to be cool - they should be serious journalists bringing us our daily dose of doom-and-gloom so we can all head out to work feeling that the world is crumbling around us - now that's a typical Monday morning!

And speaking of facelifts, can one of the producers kindly point out to our Matt that showing up in an ultraexpensive designer suit but coupled to an unkempt, patchy, barely visible grey/white fluffy growth on his face is hardly the kind of facelift that the show is trying to achieve. He just looks unwashed  and messy, and it's bad for the brand. Yes, a guy in his twenties who comes to work unshaven can still look kinda good (especially as the hair is not white!) but it's an entirely different thing for a middle-aged man - one who actually looks older than his age with that growth. 

It's as if our Matt is ready for retirement already! Can't be bothered making the effort and shaving each morning anymore. Surely someone has hinted that it's not a great look for him, and he does not look clean on camera? Perhaps it looks better in person, but for sure on camera it's unclean. Beards should only be worn by those who can grow a real one - like in the old days in the Navy, a man had to go to the ship's captain and ask permission to grow a beard. The experienced old salt could look at a sailor's face and determine easily whether it would be "a real beard" or "a messy excuse", and his decision was final. 

The facial hair is not the only cosmetic work-up of late, and it is accurate to say that the whole presentation has been altered, mainly to keep up with the Joneses, i.e. by apparently outright copying of the format of the competition. Now all four "hosts" sit together giggling at one bigger desk (a virtual kitchen table) in an effort to clone the "one big happy family" reality of other shows such as Good Morning America or CBS Saturday. The difference being that those shows are leading for a reason - the conviviality and collegiality is real, not forced, nor faked for the camera. You simply cannot clone friendship and happiness. 

I find the new format to be a total distraction. Can I just get my morning news presented in a serious and professional fashion, in a manner that has been historically aligned with the NBC brand? All the chatter, and raised coffee mugs and jokes should be saved for the 8am (if not 9am) time slot, and the first hour should be serious news and no nonsense.  Bring back the glory days of total pro Bryant Gumbel and darling Jane Pauley, puh-lease! I ain't gettin' all nostalgic here people - even with all the new gadgets and social media candyfloss - these two could still do it better than anyone! Very touching also to have seen them both return to the show in December to help out as co-hosts, on a celebration of Matt's 56th birthday. 

I mean, what is Al Roker needed for at that anchor's desk? He's the weatherman, has been for essentially two decades now, and his place is at that new fancy giant touchscreen they gave him for Christmas - not at the anchor's desk. He's employed to say "Here's what's happening in your neck of the woods", a million times per day, and not as a newsbringer or commentator. Thanks God NBC did listen to me on that, and he almost never mentions "Your neck of the woods" today. They can give him all the massive screens and extra time they want, but even as he incessantly prances and pants in front of the giant image trying to whip us into a weather-laced frenzy, I simply yawn and cry out "Can we get back to some actual news, pleeeeease!"

It's the weather, people! Look out your window, and there you have it. We don't need it to become the new main feature, wheeled in as an excuse for any real depth and content. Ditto the godamn "Orange room" where hosting journeyman Carson Daly now presides and keeps us all so wonderfully up-to-date with the social media world. Yawn. Listen y'all, it's 2014! That may seem like a strange comment, and I can hear y'all yelling at me that in 2014, social media is the big thing and I should accept its dominance on the show. 

Duh. Yes. I know. Well, actually, social media was the big thing in 2012 and 2013. Ergo? We all know how to use it and most of us do use it. I don't need some tech team at NBC to tell me what people are saying about Savannah's gold lame dress, on air, when I am watching my news - I can go on Twitter during the advertisements and see the nonsense for myself! The Orange room is another excuse for what is missing in abundance - good, old-fashioned, content. However, many clouds do have a silver lining indeed, and the one major attraction of the Orange room is the presence in there of the sparkling, indefatigable Tamron Hall - that alone can justify its existence, until it is evaporated. 

All of this new style and panache has been incorporated into the shows that were in competition with Today, and those shows got it right, as evidenced by their ascent to the very tip of Everest in the ratings - a spot that was owned by NBC's Today for centuries. Ok, make that decades!  But Today was always a leader, never a follower, and trying to turn the show into a hotter version of the cooler competition simply isn't working. Oh my God, am I going to get emotional enough where I will put into print "Come back Ann Curry, all is forgiven!" - well, not quite. Not least as I am sure that she hasn't forgiven anyone involved in her exit debacle.

I hate to harp on about it but sadly, again, I remain convinced that the Today show is burdened with the sagging Lauer brand, and while he has done a stellar job and has had staggering personal success, it is time for him to do the right thing and find something else in life to do. Trust me, both the executive producers and NBC/Universal head honchos will all collectively sigh in relief; the problem just solved itself. Don't give me any nonsense about Willie Geist not being ready - Matt Lauer wasn't ready when he stepped into my man Bryant Gumbel's huge shoes in 1997! For a long time Matt was wearing the shoes, but Gumbel's massive footprint left a very big shadow around his feet. 

It's a job you have to settle into and grow into - almost no one is truly "ready" before they are dumped into the deep end - perhaps with the exception of the best bit of casting ever done on that show, when the remarkable Meredith Vieira was hired. So, we need to exit the fading star, get our boy Willie into the hotseat, and then decide whether Savannah can keep up with him. I have my doubts on that, but will be happy to be surprised if the chemistry is electric on camera. 

Come on NBC. Drop all of the distractions, or tone them down to where they belong - the 9am slot. Get back to a two anchor desk, and make that first hour serious in tone and brimming with content, saving the candyfloss fluff for the stay-at-home folks who want entertained at 8:30-10:00am. At 7am in the morning, we want news, news and then more news. Do I need to remind you that at 7am on weekdays, your audience is not the kids, nor barely even the 30-somethings - it is a mature audience looking for information, not nonsense coming in via social media and the Orange room. 

I can go back to work on Monday more easily now, truly feeling that I no longer miss much when I don't see my Today show, and at least for now, the CBS  (particularly on Saturday and Sunday mornings) and ABC crews rule the morning show ecosystem as far as I am concerned. You only have to spend a few minutes in the company of Biana Golodryga and Dan Harris, or Charlie Rose and Gayle King, or the stellar Anthony Mason and former co-host Rebecca Jarvis to feel the genuine warmth in the air - a warmth that is clearly missing in the chilly corridors outside the offices of the Today show. 

Remember, NBC, you can pay people all the money you (they!) want to fake it on camera and pretend to be friends in real life, but chemistry cannot be constructed and those who fake it to make it remain just that - fakes. The real thing is abundantly obvious, and the facade is even more evident than that. The Today show franchise remains in crisis, and it is going to be fascinating to see who is going to dig them out of it but more importantly, how they are going to try to do it. Fear not EU peeps, I will of course be keeping you up-to-date with their (lack of) progress!  - Kevin Mc ;)