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And Finally Artist News
Morrissey denies trying to force Paws to cancel US show
By Andy Malt | Published on Monday 12 May 2014
A spokesperson for Morrissey has denied that the singer tried to force Paws to cancel a show in California last week.
The Glasgow band supporting We Are Scientists at The Constellation Room on Thursday, a smaller venue connected to Santa Ana’s Observatory, where Morrissey was performing the same night.
In a lengthy Facebook post, Paws explained: “We received a call from the promoter/venue telling us that Morrissey … had requested that no live music be heard during his set. So, in order to adhere to curfews, this would mean that we couldn’t play our opening slot as it would clash with Morrissey’s and We Are Scientists’ headline show would be cut short and heavily delayed (until after Morrissey’s show)”.
They continued: “We were then informed that in respect of this cancellation, we had been offered to be paid double our guarantee for our troubles as per a clause in the contract for the show, but it was also asserted that we didn’t really have a choice in the matter; for example, we didn’t really get any sort of option to try and make the show work, it was just very cut and dry. So in short, we were essentially getting paid not to play”.
Reacting to the request, the band said: “Although all bands in our situation could very much do with the extra money, it didn’t sit right with us that we were essentially, very much literally, being silenced; being bought out, and for reasons that, when explained to us as above, not only seemed trivial but seemed to fit the unfortunate egotistical stereotypes that Morrissey has come to embody in recent years, not least as we had been informed that he has already been noted for cancelling several shows”
The show later went ahead without cancellation, after the set times were moved to, in We Are Scientist’s words, “after Moz’s bedtime”.
This gave WAS time to pop in and watch Morissey’s performance, on which they commented via Twitter: “Turns out the reason Morrissey doesn’t want competing noise is that it might clue people in to what singing in tune sounds like”.
A spokesperson for Morrissey later denied that Morrissey had made any request for Paws to cancel their set, telling Pitchfork: “Morrissey had nothing to do with this. As long as there was no sound bleed, Morrissey was completely fine with another show going on inside the same complex”.
