Such a ruthless unpacking of one man's psyche. It's morbidly fascinating to come here and read so many posts (both insightful and awful) from folks hell-bent on eviscerating Morrissey's internal and external life, right down to the smallest shred. It's like dogs worrying a favorite toy, once loved but now ragged, torn and leaking stuffing all over the house; he's all chewed up and slobbered over, but still an object of obsessive interest.
In answer: wanker yes, charlatan, absolutely not. No one, not even his greatest detractors can say that Morrissey is an artistic "pygmy." Call him anything else you want, he's as guilty as most of us of occasional weakness, pettiness and poor judgement, but don't call him mediocre. He started out as one of the tribe: just another bespectacled, vegetarian, bookish, introverted, Wildean wanna-be who needed to get things off his chest. Unlike the rest of us, Morrissey stepped upon the stage, was accorded his moment in the limelight and (with the alchemical J. Marr) spun that energy into decades of inspiration. Every great artist starts out as a weird kid who hops a bus, has an epiphany and then sticks to their guns.
Morrissey's voice is very beautiful, but that melting tenor is not just a happy physical accident: you cannot separate the singer from the song. The man (still) sings with an emotional complexity and punch that belies the idea that he's a blustering simpleton pulling a fast one. A great singer saves their best self for their music and the stage; everything else is incidental and small (as the man himself has said many a time). I agree that Morrissey has come very close to undermining his vast accomplishments with his staggeringly obtuse comments of late - as I said elsewhere, I often wonder if he's intentionally bringing himself down to Earth after all those years spent on Olympus: "see me as I am again" and all that.
I won't argue with you about Morrissey's current incarnation as a well-off wanderer, a man without a culture shopping and hopping from one luxury hotel to the next, shedding relevance as he goes. Not a good place to be for an artist. I would point out, however, that fame is terribly isolating and that a thin-skinned, introverted, depressive wordsmith with enough empathy to sing like he still does is ripe for a particular kind of fall. I would also point out that one's fans are one's family; the longer you're famous, the truer that becomes. Morrissey's relationship to his audience is troubled and turbulent, but all the knives being tossed at him here serve no purpose but to make the tossers feel better (intentional). I would also love him to rebound, to find meaning and fire again, to train his laser on a worthy subject, but any expression of disappointment that deepens into the kind of continuous, vindictive abuse found on this site only feeds the notion that he's succeeded wildly in owning his abusers.
Yes, I am American, but I lived in England when I was very young (I saw "Bloody Saturday" firsthand). I also lived up North, and many of my most intense memories involve brown wallpaper, crumbling pleasure piers, X-Ray Spex and bird stumps. The world that Morrissey sprang from is not entirely alien to me. I would like to point out that many Americans "get" Morrissey - there are aspects of his art and personality that are universal. The nuances of his work may be lost on many on this side of the divide, but his essential message comes through loud and clear. Of course, Anglophilia still rages here, witness the appalling "Downton Abbey" silliness (although many are transfixed by "Parade's End"). "Doctor Who" is more popular than ever.
I have resisted commenting on Thatcher - it's not my place. I will say that she and Reagan ushered in the age of evangelical selfishness. She was deeply unkind and Morrissey's points are all well-taken: anyone who opposed the international ban on ivory lacked a sense of basic human decency. Over here we have to live through the endless deification of Reagan, the man who first deployed the religious right as political foot soldiers in the war on decency, kindness and common sense. Be careful over there - don't let them paper over their crimes.
