As the Christmas break got underway, Morrissey posted some updates to his website confirming that he is starting the new year without management or a label in place, and with one less collaborator.
At the end of October, it was announced that Morrissey had signed up with Universal Music’s Capitol label in the US for the release of his next album ‘Bonfire Of Teenagers’. Although, the official announcement of that tie-up was keen to stress, the deal excluded the UK where the often controversial musician is generally considered too controversial these days.
At the time we wondered whether this alliance with a Universal label would end up going the same way as the last one. Morrissey worked with the major’s Harvest imprint on his 2014 album ‘World Peace Is None Of Your Business’, but artist and label fell out shortly after that record was released.
This time round, however, things have gone very differently. In that artist and label have seemingly fallen out before the record has even been made available.
We got a hint of that last month when Morrissey confirmed that the planned February release of ‘Bonfire Of Teenagers’ was now on hold and the record’s fate was “exclusively in the hands of Capitol Records (Los Angeles)”.
Then earlier this month he started talking about his work on ‘Without Music The World Dies’, the follow-up album to the as yet unreleased ‘Bonfire Of Teenagers’.
In a quick pre-Christmas update, Morrissey properly confirmed that the alliance with Universal Music is off. “Morrissey has voluntarily withdrawn from any association with Capitol Records (Los Angeles)”, the short statement announced.
Though if you were thinking of calling Morrissey’s management team to find out who might release either ‘Bonfire Of Teenagers’ or ‘Without Music The World Dies’, well, hard luck. “Morrissey has voluntarily parted company with Maverick/Quest management”, that statement also noted.
Although we do actually know that Capitol US still has the rights to release ‘Bonfire Of Teenagers’, providing it first removes at least one of the guest vocalists that appears on it. We got that information from a Christmas Eve statement from Morrissey Central.
“Miley Cyrus now wants to be taken off the song ‘I Am Veronica’ for which she volunteered backing vocals almost two years ago”, declared said statement. “This comes at a time when Morrissey has disassociated himself with Capitol Records (Los Angeles), who control the hidden album ‘Bonfire Of Teenagers’”.
So, there you go, some festive fun-times at Morrissey HQ.