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And Finally Beef Of The Week
CMU Beef Of The Week #46: Johnny Marr v David Cameron
By Andy Malt | Published on Saturday 4 December 2010
We’re still not entirely sure what sparked this sudden outburst from Johnny Marr on Twitter this week – the Prime Minister has been professing a love for the guitarist’s former band for some time now – but nonetheless, Marr announced yesterday: “David Cameron, stop saying that you like The Smiths, no you don’t. I forbid you to like it”.
Cameron picked ‘This Charming Man’ as one of his favourite songs on Radio 4’s ‘Desert Island Discs’ four years ago, and in February last year he actually went so far as to pre-empt the band’s distaste for him, saying on BBC One’s ‘The One Show’: “I’m sure when Morrissey finds that he’s getting an endorsement from the leader of the Conservative Party, he will think ‘Heaven knows I’m miserable now’. But I’m a big fan, I’m afraid. Sorry about that”
Morrissey, at the time, simply said: “It’s difficult to make comment because you might hurt people’s feelings”.
Johnny Marr joined Twitter a month before Cameron issued that apology, so it’s not like he hasn’t had the opportunity to make his feelings known before now. Although, he did only begin personally updating his Twitter feed a few months ago. Maybe this is something that’s been bubbling away for some time that he can no longer hold in. Marr, after all, has always been politically active (and anti-Conservative), particularly at the height of The Smiths’ 80s fame.
Or maybe everyone (including me) is giving this far too much scrutiny. After much hilarity following the post of the tweet by Marr, comments started appearing giving the guitarist a sound telling off. In one such case, the NME published a blog post on its website in which Marr was informed that he is not allowed to choose who his fans are and should stop stomping around like a spoilt child.
Marr followed this up today by simply saying: “I see the recession has affected some people’s sense of humour”.
This Beef Of The Week comes from this edition of the CMU Weekly. Subscribe to the CMU Weekly here.
