There has been the vague, wet, typical outpouring of mild-ire surrounding an indie band allowing one of their songs to be used in advertising. It’s ‘selling-out’ apparently. And god knows, that’s the worst thing an indie band can be accused of, right?

And of course, there’s a terribly saccharine John Lewis advertisement that’s doing the Christmas rounds this year which features a cover version of The Smiths’ ‘Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want’.

Johnny Marr is at pains to point out that the song featuring in a commercial doesn’t sully the memory of the song at all and The Smiths haven’t sold out, actually. And you know something, he’s right to say that it doesn’t sully the memory of the band.

Marr took to twitter to answer disappointed Smiths fans (is there any other kind of Smiths fan?) and claimed that the memory of the group hadn’t been sullied at all.

He said:

Writing ‘Please Please…’ one Friday in ’84 is one of the best memories of my life. This ad has not sullied that memory one bit.

He went on to criticise the fans who had been…

“bitching and moaning whilst, wait for it, watching X Factor”

And Marr is absolutely correct in his assertion that the use of a cover of a Smiths song in a television advert doesn’t sully the memory of the band because, the point here is that we’re dealing with a band so gaspingly overrated, so mediocre from top-to-bottom that any use of their song doesn’t harm their legacy, rather, brings the fine reputation of John Lewis down.

That’s right. Lovely John Lewis who sell all those nice things are now associated with dismal, vacant 6th form poetry shot through faux-kitchen sinkery and a collection of faces so long that you could trip over their chins.

Poor ol’ John Lewis. Being lumped in with those talentless berks.

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Is Morrissey having a very public nervous breakdown? It certainly seems that way. See, at the moment, you can’t move for stories about him being wildly erratic and saying things which aren’t as considered as they once were.

Of course, The Mozfather has always been good for a quote and, indeed, regardless of the fact he has contributed to some of the most awful music ever cut to wax, he was always worth reading about.

However, these days he’s less a vinegary old tart with a razor sharp wit and more a bumbling idiot, dribbling out nonsense in a bid to get any sort of attention from the world. No, he’s not ordering security staff to strip-search the people of Middlesbrough for secreted meats, but comparing the savage killings in Norway to fast-food.

Basically, the former Smiths warbler has kicked up a large stink (almost as bad as vegetarian flatulence) after comparing the Norwegian massacre to the slaughter of animals for fast-food restaurant chains.

During a show in Warsaw, Moz allegedly said:

“We all live in a murderous world, as the events in Norway have shown, with 97 dead. Though that is nothing compared to what happens in McDonald’s and Kentucky Fried shit every day.”

This all comes on the back of a series of incredibly odd things (apparently) uttered by Morrissey. After stomping off stage in a huff because he could smell burgers, he also went and called Chinese people a “sub-species”.

He also once said:

“Killing a stag is like killing a child. What’s the difference?”

It really does seem like he’s in the throes of a nervous breakdown and, if we’re correct, this can only end in Mozza being found weeping in a square, naked and binge-eating raw meat while rubbing coagulated pig’s blood into his writhing torso while singing Baldhead Growler’s ‘Sausage’.

Can’t wait.

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STOP THE PRESS! Or update the gossip website really quickly or something! Swarthy Alan Bennett-wannabee Steven ‘Morrissey’ Morrissey is a bit grumpy about some things!

Anyone who has seen a recent photo of the stocky serenader would think the irony of his well-known vegetarian fizzog currently resembling someone who belongs behind the counter of your local butchers has annoyed him but NO! He’s grumpy about EVERY SINGLE THING THAT GIVES HIM ANY SORT OF A PUBLIC PROFILE EVER!

The utter WEAPON.

Firstly: his fans. They love him and they create websites dedicated to him, chief of which is morrissey-solo.com. What does he then do? Appear on stage wearing a t-shirt bearing the slogan “FUCK MORRISSEY-SOLO.COM”? Yes. In Bradford this week, of all places.

One irate user of said website responded by describing themselves as “a Mexican married to a white girl, who eats pussy not meat”, but we’re still trying to figure out how that might be relevant.

Secondly: the music industry. Did we mention that Steven ‘Morrissey’ Morrissey doesn’t have a record deal at the moment? Hmm. He explains:

“Not many labels want bands who have already made their mark, because their success is usually attributed to some other label somewhere else at another time.”

Yes, that’ll be it Steven. No-one wants to sign you for fear of being unfavourably-compared to the heady days of the Rough Trade recording label back in 1987 you tool.

Thirdly: the Smiths. Actually we might have to give this one to Steven. He played a load of Smiths songs during his overlooked set at Glastonbury despite the seemingly-endless spat with all former band-members, prompting ex-drummer (DRUMMER!) Mike Joyce to announce on twitter that he “didn’t like the cover versions”. Yes. We’ll let Steve-O have that one.

And the internet, which Stevie believes has “obviously wiped music off the human map”, unaware of the fact that the internet has allowed people to access his entire back-catalogue in less than a millisecond flat before disregarding everything after “Hatful Of Hollow”. And that’s being generous.

NEXT WEEK: “Morrissey Isn’t Fond Of That Funny Noise The Fridge Sometimes Makes.”

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If there was ever an example of a grown man acting like a stubborn child, then we’d have to point in the direction of Morrissey [or ourselves - Ed]. We imagine that if he was still at school, he’d be the child cursing the sunshine on a warm sunny day and generally mooching around the playground with a storm cloud permanently attached to his head.

For those unfamiliar with Moz, he was the lead singer with the vastly overrated and generally annoying band The Smiths. At the time, Moz and his band of merry men might have looked like radicals, but by today’s standards, he’s just a whiny tit.

But to his credit Morrissey has stuck to his guns and protested his hatred for the royal family. Despite the rest of the country recently warming to William and Kate, Morrissey is still upset with the Winsors.

As you might of heard, there was recently a Royal Wedding. You probably missed our liveblog. And with the newspapers trying to whip up a frenzy of gatecrashers attempting to ruin the event, the day ended as a success with William and Kate looking like the sort of people who’d join you in the pub for a pint and give you £1.50 for a kebab if you happen to be running low on funds. Not that they’d actually associate with scum like you and us.

We don’t know if Morrissey likes William and Kate, but from what we’ve read over the weekend, he isn’t a fan of the Queen, otherwise known as the grand supreme ruler of the United Kingdom. Oddly, he’s been comparing the Queen to a dictator over the weekend. You know, one of those cute and cuddly types who butchers and kills their own people or just tortures them for shits and giggles.

Morrissey said:

“She would not hesitate to turn her tanks on the British people. The royal family, to me, are not England, and they are not the flag. So, therefore people can become misguided into believing that the Queen is the heart of England, and that she represents England. But she doesn’t in the least. There are people like me who were not interested, and we’re many in number, and we’re not easily fooled. And we see the Queen as the ultimate dictator. And it is dictatorship. It’s forced upon the British people.”

Yup, we got bored after reading the first sentence as well. Basically, Morrissey seems to be implying that the Queen is going to fire exploding corgis at us when we least expect it so we all cower under the might of Prince Phillip and Harry, as they parade around the country dressed as Nazis. This theory of Mozza’s however doesn’t come as a surprise as he is known as a self opinionated twat who tends to spout utter rubbish whilst trying to get people to follow his own beliefs, kind of like some sort of dictator.

Just like us.

Unlike us, Morrissey is one of those pesky vegetarian types and recently demanded that when he performed at The Lokerse Feesten in Belgium, the whole festival had to be meat free. Just because the thought of a cheeseburger might make him do a small cry – and that’s without any onions being on the succulent meaty treat. One person telling a whole load of others what to do? That’s not dictatorial at all!

Perhaps we could just put an end to Morrissey once and for all by constructing a thirty foot pentagram made entirely out of bacon outside of house.

Because it would be puerile and funny.

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Morrissey. He’s an icon to limp wristed introverts who hole themselves up in their bedrooms with shelves full of kitchen sink dramas and books of dreadful self-written mewing poetry about being misunderstood and shit. They’re all very individual of course and don’t all flock to Salford Lad’s Club for yet another stupid photo.

Now, as lame as Mozza is, he’s always good value in interviews when he’s in Queen Bitch mode. Now he’s having a pop at Queen. No, not Freddie Mercury’s corpse or Brian May’s clogs. Rather, he doesn’t like Her Majesty the Queen’s liking of fur hats.

That’d be hats made from cute animals. Just in case you didn’t know where fur came from. Imagine Kissyfur. Now imagine wearing him as a nice snood. Appealing eh?

Anyway, Morrissey has urged the Queen to stop British Army Guards wearing real fur hats.

In a letter to The Times, the singer insisted that the responsibility of ensuring the guards do not wear real bearskin falls to the monarch.

He wrote:

“It is difficult not to look to the Queen herself – after all, they are her guards, and she must surely be aware of the horrific process utilised to supply real bearskins for her guards.

“The mere sight of each bearskin hat must surely jab at the Queen’s heart.”

Presuming she’s got one of course.

Morrissey added:

“Yes, animal rights move different people differently, and there are even those who think that animals simply have no right to be, but there is no sanity in making life difficult on purpose for the Canadian brown bear, especially for guards’ hats that look absurd in the first place, and which can easily be replaced by faux versions (thanks to the visionary Stella McCartney) with no death involved.”

Maybe the Queen will reply with… ‘Fair do’s. We’ll do a trade. You get The Smiths back together to appease those wet shits who follow your every word and I’ll stop my men wearing hats that look like Johnny Marr’s head in the ’80s.’

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Jesus, we know when we’re being outdone. Most of the time, it’s when an unborn Japanese child severely beats us on FIFA. And we don’t mean by using the hand of God in extra time.

And then there’s Morrissey. Somehow, Morrissey is classed as a genius despite still singing songs that an old band of his wrote years ago and releasing solo albums that are properly gash.

Recently, Morrissey has had a bit of problems on the gig scene. He passed out in Swindon and then got twatted in the face with a cup in Liverpool. Surely it’s full steam ahead from here, right? Wrong! Continuing his tour to Hamburg, Morrissey got narked off with a fan who dared boo his miserable rant on meat-eaters. And what happened? Find out after the jump!

See what Morrissey did there? What word does Hamburg sound like? Go on, have a quick think about it, we won’t rush you. Almost there? Excellent, by now even your child should have answered ‘hamburger’. If they said hammers, then they’re probably dyslexic.

Morrissey, of course, is a vegan type person who doesn’t like people chomping on cows or drinking their milk. We don’t know what the fuss is personally – have you ever tried to make your own chocolate milk? If it wasn’t for cows producing strawberry, vanilla or chocolate flavours, we’d never get through a working day. According to NME.com, the singer became annoyed after someone mocked his shit joke on hamburgers:

“Morrissey was speaking about how “Hamburgers” should be called “Hamburgists” when the audience member shouted “fuck you” at him.”

Oh Morrissey, you are one crazy carrot-crunching vegan loon. We understand your opinion on us evil meat-eaters, but so buggery. We’re as happy as a butcher’s dog who’s just found some mouldy sausages behind the freezer when we tuck into a lunchtime sandwich that’s oozing with something that’s come from an animal.

All we can suggest to the constantly peed-off singer is to assemble an audience made completely out of fruit and vegetables. There they’ll have a wonderful time and no-one will attempt to rebel. Though they’ll stop short of burning a piece of bacon at the steak in vegan anger. It could result in a mini BBQ and cause all sorts of unwanted trouble from savages.

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Everyone knows Morrissey. He’s that loveable vegan from Manchester who complains about everything and then goes in to a big vegetable huff when things go pear-shaped.

Only a couple of weeks ago, he collapsed at a gig in Swindon. Perhaps he saw what the people there looked like and wanted out. Pronto.

In the latest shenanigan involving the former Smiths front man, he got pelted with a plastic cup of water in Liverpool. Now he didn’t fall over, his feeble vegan body did manage to withstand the force of the close range throw. Still, he did get soaked worse than a potato patch and stormed off the stage. Interested in seeing the video? Of course you are. It’s right after the jump.

We’ve been to many gigs and a cup of water isn’t that big a deal. Prior to most gigs we drink many plastic pints of fizzy lager and often need a mid-gig wee. Going to the toilet is a bit of a pain so we just use the cup and lob it away. And we’ve been accused of not having green credentials. So it could have been worse, a lot worse.

You do have to remember where he was performing, though. The clip appears to show Morrissey interacting with the Liverpudlian crowd. That was already a stupid thing to do, as any jewellery he was wearing could have gone walkabouts, or his wallet pinched.

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Hooray! It’s that time of year again where bands of all genres play to thousands of music lovers around the world.

And, thanks to its eclectic line-up and decent weather, Coachella is becoming one of the biggest. Hosted in a Californian desert, people flock from all over America to attend.

One of this year’s performers was Morrissey – a man so removed of happiness that a trip to a furniture shop, a stint watching paint dry and a visit to a cemetery bring more joy than an hour of his company. The much-publicised vegetarian got slightly pissy during his Friday slot as his nostrils sniffed the odour of burgers and other meaty delights. Of course he didn’t keep his opinions to himself.

Morrisey may not know this, but for billions of years the species known as man has hunted and killed animals. He chomped on a tasty bit of animal and used its skin to keep warm for himself and his ladyfriend. It’s only really been in recent years, after we gained some brains and stopped throwing spears at each other, that the idea of vegetarianism/veganism has spawned.

Vegetarians believe it’s extremely evil to eat an animal to cure hunger and that person will end up in hell where a demon cow will punch him in the face every hour as a way of making up for his sins. For the more radical thinkers, there is something called veganism. Not eating an animal isn’t good enough, so these people don’t wear anything made from animals or use certain products if animal extracts are contained in them, like a hen’s eyeball in a car tyre or something.

Whilst we don’t know the extent of Morrissey’s animal beliefs, we do know that he gets pretty worked up about the issue. On several occasions in the past, he’s mouthed off and told us all we’re pretty bad for eating a helpless cow or a cute little pig. God help him if he stumbled over to certain countries in Asia.

During his performance at Coachella, Morrissey’s passion for spreading the joy of non-meat based products came out in force. Whilst we badly wanted him to be dressed as a giant stick of celery, handing out leaflets and confusing drugged up hippies, he didn’t. NME reports that midway through the set, Morrissey said:

“I can smell burning flesh and I hope to God it’s human,” as the smell of barbecued meat from nearby food stands wafted through the air. A few minutes later, the famous vegetarian walked off the stage in the middle of ‘Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others’. He returned shortly afterward, saying, “The smell of burning animals is making me sick. I just couldn’t bear it.”

We can only assume that when he sulked off stage, he poured a bowl of fruit punch over his head whilst chanting out loud. “MEAT IS EVIL! MEAT IS EVIL! MEAT IS EVIL! I AM MORRISSEY AND I WON’T LET THIS BEAT ME!” After finishing off a watermelon in three impressive bites, he returned to the stage to further depress the audience.

It’s quite strange really when we actually sit down and think about the whole ‘Ooh eating meat is wrong’ issue. Yes, cuddly furry lambs are allowed to age for a few years before being butchered in to yummy Sunday roast. However, have you spared a thought for the poor roast potatoes, carrots, peas and pieces of broccoli that accompany them? They also had to grow from something and are subsequently a living organism. Therefore, you’re eating a living and growing thing, just like a animal. In the words of a sheep “its baaaaaaaaaaaaad man”.

Therefore, all of you bloody whiney vegetarians and vegans have no argument to stand on. If you won’t eat meat, don’t eat vegetables/fruit either. You’ll have to survive on toilet duck or make a magic device that recycles leftover food. Sermon over. Next time, there will be more poo and wee jokes. We promise.

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Good news, people: the world’s second biggest twat, otherwise known as Jonathan Edward Borrell, is to be murdered.

OK, OK, yeahyeahyeah, it’s only going to happen in a movie, but sometimes life imitates art, right? Right? Right. We can but hope. Our fingers remain firmly crossed.

Borrell is to star in the new film by Antonia Bird and Irvine Welsh, named The Meat Trade, and will be killed by two grave robbers, played by Robert Carlyle and Colin Firth. Jonathan Edward told the Daily Star:

"It's going to be so much fun. I love horror and I'm a really big fan of Irvine Welsh's work. I loved Trainspotting."

Oh, it’s horror! There should be lots of blood then. Let’s hope Antonia and Irvine get twat number one, Bono, involved. And Keane. And The Feeling. Oh, please The Feeling. And why not stab Luke Pritchard of The Kooks in the mouth with a rusty screwdriver while you’re at it? Why not?

The film is about two body snatchers snatching bodies in Edinburgh and should be released sometime next year. Hecklerspray waits with baited breath. But how will Borrell die, Irvine?

Hecklerspray likes to think Carlyle and Firth will recruit sometime actor Bob Dylan to do this excellent deed. On the release of his band’s debut, Up All Night, Borrell spouted some awful shit out of his mouth-arsehole which decided it was better than Dylan’s first album proper. Get your own back, Bob. But do it for real like Brandon Lee. Come on. Be a sport.

Or, if Bob can’t be reached for some reason, why not contact Morrissey? Borrell did “feel sorry” for Moz when he somehow didn’t manage to draw as big a crowd at V Festival a few years back. People really are stupid.

You are now officially 87% stupider if you voluntarily listen to Johnny Borrell’s arsehole gibberings with feelings of enjoyment. Really. They’ve done tests and everything. We don’t know who “they” are but we’re sure these tests have been done. Kind of.

Too harsh? Not harsh enough we say.

Release Mark Chapman already.

Read more:

Johnny Borrell To Be Murdered In New Movie – AngryApe 

No, not a Morrisons advert – Alan Hansen and Lulu are already doing a bang-up job of starring in those bloody things themselves – a Morrissey advert.

As you probably know, Morrissey has a Greatest Hits collection coming out soon – even though two thirds of the songs on it are from his last two pretty ropey albums – and he needs your help with adverts for it.

Everyone reading this has a chance to be in the new Morrissey adverts, provided they love Morrissey enough to have previously mutilated their body out of chronically misplaced devotion to the man. He's an email we got telling how you people can get involved:

Decca today launches an online search for the most devoted Morrissey fans to star in the advert for his new Greatest Hits album. Do you have any Morrissey tattoos? Have you ever graffiti'd Morrissey's name on a wall? Do you own amazing Morrissey Memorabilia? Then this is your chance to show it.

Entrants should send high quality jpeg images illustrating their devotion to Morrissey to morrisseyadvert@googlemail.com. The best images will be used in the advertising for Morrissey – Greatest Hits.

If this sounds like you then a) seriously? and b) good luck. We'll have to live this one vicariously through you, because it's too late for us. We misread the subject of the email and rushed out to have a massive picture of Alan Hansen pushing a trolley tattooed on our back. Damn our hastiness. Damn it to hell.

Morrissey might be getting it from all sides thanks to those anti-immigration remarks he supposedly made in the NME, but he'll always have one lifelong fan in the shape of Russell Brand.

Russell Brand loves Morrissey so much that he's got a pet cat named Morrissey, and every time he's tried to interview Morrissey he's quickly dissolved into giggling fits of awkward schoolboy fandom. And now Russell Brand's love for Morrissey has been reciprocated. No, Morrissey hasn't bought a cat and named it Russell Brand – there's a chance the cat might have come from another country and partially helped to destroy the British identity, meaning that Morrissey would have to knock it unconscious with a spanner and throw it out of the window, or something – but he's letting Russell Brand be in his new video. According to an email we just got off some bloke:

Popular comedian, TV star and noted author Russell Brand is to star in the promo video for Morrissey's forthcoming single That's How People Grow Up. That's How People Grow Up is due for release on 28th January, one week prior to a 15 track Greatest Hits which spans his unique 20-year solo career.

The video to Morrissey's new single hasn't been released yet, so we can't tell you if it's good or a self-indulgent bag of cock. But, you know, take a guess. 

OK, not quite. But Morrissey has decided to tell his side of the Morrissey/ NME immigration yarn to the most unbiased arena in the land – the official Morrissey website.

Last week, Morrissey's torrent of alleged anti-immigration codswallop shocked all NME readers – so basically about a dozen 14-year-olds with funny haircuts and cupboards full of skinny ties – to such an extent that Morrissey was forced to sue the magazine. And today on his website, Morrissey is going to explain that actually he's not a racist, that the NME ignored his requests to help out on an anti-racism campaign and – perhaps most shockingly of all – the interviewer fidgeted a bit and laughs like a schoolgirl.

Oh, it's on.

When you're being interviewed by the NME, there are a few things that you absolutely mustn't talk about. Never call the swastika beautiful, never state your deep-rooted love for Phil Collins and never bang on about all the bloody immigrants like an old lady who's just found out that her grandson-in-law is a one-armed Albanian pirate DVD salesman.

Morrissey, though, allegedly hasn't heeded these rules – his favourite song is Invisible Touch and he doesn't care who knows. Oh, and he allegedly hates all immigrants a bit too. That's what came out in Morrissey's recent NME coverstory, where he apparently said:

"England is a memory now. The gates are flooded and anybody can have access to England and join in."

And since then Morrissey has decided to sue the NME for defamation.

So today Morrissey will publish a statement on his official website – we think it's www.kosovansgohome.com, though we're not sure – that will explain his side of the story to his fans. It's long, a bit rambling and contains the phrase "deep in the bosom of time", so we've picked out the relevant bits for you:

"I abhor racism and oppression or cruelty of any kind and will not let this pass without being absolutely clear and emphatic with regard to what my position is. Racism is beyond common sense and I believe it has no place in our society. To anyone who has shown or felt any interest in my music in recent times, you know my feelings on the subject and I am writing this to apologise unreservedly for granting an interview to the NME. I had no reason whatsoever to assume that they could be anything other than devious, truculent and unreliable. In the event, they have proven to be all three."

Morrissey, after a spot of reminiscing about how all of this used to be fields, then goes on to describe the interview with NME writer Tim Jonze himself:

"I do not mean to be rude to Tim Jonze, but when I first caught sight of him I assumed that someone had brought their child along to the interview. The runny nose told the whole story. Conor had assured that Tim was their best writer. Talking behind his hands in an endless fidget, Tim accepted every answer I gave him with a schoolgirl giggle, and repeatedly asked me if I was shocked at how little he actually knew about music. I told him that, yes, I was shocked."

And if there's one thing that Morrissey can't stand it's people who giggle girlishly and fidget. Well, that and probably the Polish.

In all, the most sensible thing here would be for both the NME and Morrissey to shut up about the whole thing until it goes to court, where a winner will be impartially chosen. All this endless mudslinging isn't pretty, and if it carries on much longer it'll end up looking as petty and ridiculous as one of our Celebrity Haiku Competition comment threads. 

And, seriously, nobody wants that.

Read more:

I won't let this pass: Morrissey defends stance in immigration row with NME - Guardian 

Morrissey – the man who appears on the cover of this week's NME spouting enough anti-immigrant polemic to make Anne Widdecombe look like a straggle-haired pot-smoking hippy – has had enough.

According to the NME, Morrissey spent the duration of a recent interview banging on about how crap immigrants are and how England isn't England any more like some of dribble-chinned retired bombardier who's just learnt that three extended Kosovan families have bought the house next door. However, Morrissey seems adamant that that everything in the NME interview is a big fat lie, and so he's followed through on his promise to sue the magazine for everything it owns.

And by 'everything it owns' we mean three Klaxons promo CDs, a sperm-stained poster of The Horrors and as much hair gel as he can possibly eat.

As one of pop's most articulate lyricists, you can always count on Morrissey to be entertaining in interviews, whether he's using them to ambiguously dance around the topic of his sexuality, rant on bitterly about his old bandmates or – as evidenced in this week's NME cover-story – make all sorts of ill-advised statements about how much he doesn't particularly like immigrants. Statements like:

"England is a memory now,"

"England was thrown away."   

and

"The higher the influx into England the more the British identity disappears. So the price is enormous. Travel to England and you have no idea where you are."

It's just about the last thing that Morrissey – a man who's happily yakked about injuring scientists without raising any eyebrows in the past – should have spoken about, thanks to the memory of all those racist-seeming songs he wrote in the 1990s and the time he twirled about wrapped in a Union Jack before an audience of skinhead National Front members. But the thing is, Morrissey says the whole interview's a lot of cock.

And that's why Morrissey has decided to sue the NME and its six-year-old editor Conor McNicholas for defamation. According to Morrissey's spokesperson:

“They have not only misquoted Morrissey, they have omitted critical parts of the interview and distorted the tone of the piece, his responses and the questions he was asked in order to try and present an inflammatory case.”

Other than acknowledging the lawsuit, the NME has yet to comment on the matter. But the simple fact that it didn't acquiesce to Morrissey's previous demand that a retraction should be published by 1pm yesterday makes the whole thing look like both sides of the disagreement are equally hell-bent on charging at each other head-first, like a crap version of the Rocky IV opening that nobody really cares about much if they're honest.

If this lawsuit does go to court, though, chances are that the unedited tapes of Morrissey's NME interview will be played for those present, and that should happily clear the mess up. For instance, Morrissey's point that critical parts of the interview were omitted could be proved, like the part where he leaned in close to interviewer Tim Jonze and muttered "I don't believe a single word of what I'm saying, you know, but if I don't say something completely ludicrous then you'll end up putting fucking Beth Ditto on the cover again instead of me."

Equally the tapes might prove that the NME gave an accurate description of the encounter with Morrissey, and rule that Morrissey is actually a bit of a racist. But if that happens, will anything change? Everyone has known forever that Morrissey is the sort of unrealistically-nostalgic fool who can't even watch Open All Hours because he thinks it's too progressive and, regardless of immigration, is still happiest complaining that English people don't work 27-hour shifts down the mines, eat a diet that mainly comprises of stale bread and lard and then die of TB at the age of 32 any more.

That's just how Morrissey is. Better just to let him keep releasing albums that nobody listens to three days after they've bought them, we'd say.

Read more:

Morrissey sues as racism row ends NME love-hate affair – Times 

If Morrissey ever gave up music, he could easily forge a second career as the sort of Telegraph-reading, wobbly-jowled splutterer who sits in the Question Time audience all night just so he can make one disparaging remark about the Polish.

Because, 17 years after he almost fatally wounded his career by jigging about in front of several National Front members wrapped in a Union Jack, Morrissey seems to be at it again. Apparently Morrissey has used an NME interview to tell the world how much he hates immigrants and how "England is a memory now." Quite why Morrissey would want to stir up such a political hornet's nest in the first place is beyond us, although we suspect that Morrissey is simply playing the shock anti-immigration card to promote his pensioner-targeted new album Is It Me Or Are Policemen Getting Younger? and its lead single I'll Put A Bloody Knife Through That Ball If It Comes Over My Fence Again.

For the simple reason that he's managed to release two solo albums in a row that weren't so awful that we wanted to saw our ears off – which we think is a first for him – Morrissey seems to have forgotten why people went off him in the first place.

That reason, if you needed reminding, was that Morrissey went a little bit doolally in the early 1990s and started writing songs like The National Front Disco, We'll Let You Know, Bengali In Platforms and Asian Rut, then danced in front of some skinheads in Finsbury Park with a Union Jack wrapped around him in a way that some people say was deliberately stoking racial divides. Plus he was wearing a gold shirt that was just horrible.

From then on, fewer people bought Morrissey's albums because it looked like he was a bit of a racist – and that's the way it stayed until the NME started interviewing Morrissey again and he was fairly contrite about the whole racism thing. Since then, Morrissey has done well to keep his opinions to himself, only allowing the occasional embarrassing dad statement about the FBI or animal testing to slip out in between releasing his mediocre singles. 

But now? Now Morrissey has decided to speak out about immigrants. Specifically how shit they all are. Whoops. Morrissey told the NME:

"England is a memory now. The gates are flooded and anybody can have access to England and join in. Although I don't have anything against people from other countries, the higher the influx into England the more the British identity disappears. So the price is enormous. Travel to England and you have no idea where you are. It matters because the British identity is very attractive. I grew up into it and I find it very quaint and amusing. Other countries have held on to their basic identity, yet it seems to me that England was thrown away. You can't say, 'Everybody come into my house, sit on the bed, have what you like, do what you like.' It wouldn't work."

However, Morrissey is now claiming that the whole interview was a "hatchet job" and is threatening the NME with lawsuits and whatnot. So maybe Morrissey was misquoted, and he was actually talking about his literal house and using England as a metaphor for his downstairs toilet or something. We just don't know.

It's worth remembering, though, that Morrissey knows a lot a lot about immigration because he is one. Right now Morrissey lives in Rome and before that he lived in Los Angeles. So perhaps Morrissey isn't completely racist and anti-immigration, but he's just doing that ridiculous ex-pat thing where you spend a few months living abroad listening to nothing but The Kinks and Blur, slowly convincing yourself that England is a quaint little picture postcard of a ruddy vicar cycling along a country lane to umpire a village cricket match, and then getting a bit pissed off when a hoody happyslaps you for your chips a day after you return.

Either way, racist or not, we're starting to see why Morrissey wasn't allowed to do Eurovision this year – we can't imagine that the sight of a middle-aged bloke with a quiff singing a song called Push Your Knysza Up Your Arse You Polish Tit would have gone down particularly well in mainland Europe.

Read more:

Morrissey blames immigration for 'disappearance' of British identity – Independent