Morrissey

Steven Patrick Morrissey (born 22 May 1959), known mononymously as Morrissey, is an English singer and songwriter.

Steven Patrick Morrissey was born on 22 May 1959 at Park Hospital in Davyhulme, Lancashire.

His parents, Elizabeth (née Dwyer) and Peter Morrissey, were Irish Catholics who had emigrated to Manchester from Dublin with his only sibling, elder sister Jacqueline, a year before his birth.

Morrissey claims he was named after American actor Steve Cochran, although he may instead have been named in honour of his father's brother who died in infancy, Patrick Steven Morrissey.

His earliest home was a council house at 17 Harper Street in the Queen's Square area of Hulme, inner Manchester, since demolished.

Living in that area as a child, he was deeply affected by the Moors murders, in which a number of local children were killed; the crimes had a lasting impression on him and would inspire the lyrics of the Smiths song "Suffer Little Children".

He also became aware of the anti-Irish sentiment in British society against Irish immigrants to Britain.

They moved because of the 1960s demolitions of almost all the Victorian-era houses in Hulme, known as 'slum clearance', and he grew up in nearby Stretford.

As a child, he developed a love of literature, kitchen sink realism, and 1960s pop music.

In the late 1970s, he fronted the punk rock band the Nosebleeds with little success before beginning a career in music journalism and writing several books on music and film in the early 1980s.

In 1970, after the 'slum clearances' of Victorian-era houses in Hulme the family moved to another council house at 384 King's Road in Stretford.

Following a primary education at St Wilfred's Primary School, Morrissey failed his 11-plus exam and proceeded to St Mary's Secondary Modern School, an experience he found unpleasant.

He excelled at athletics, though he was an unpopular loner at the school.

He has been critical of his formal education, later stating, "The education I received was so basically evil and brutal. All I learnt was to have no self-esteem and to feel ashamed without knowing why."

He left school in 1975, having received no formal qualifications.

He continued his education at Stretford Technical College, where he gained three O-Levels in English literature, sociology, and the General Paper.

In 1975, he travelled to the U.S. to visit an aunt who lived in Staten Island.

The relationship between his parents was strained, and they ultimately separated in December 1976, with his father moving out of the family home.

He came to prominence as the frontman and lyricist of rock band the Smiths, who were active from 1982 to 1987.

Since then, he has pursued a successful solo career.

Morrissey's music is characterised by his baritone voice and distinctive lyrics with recurring themes of emotional isolation, sexual longing, self-deprecating and dark humour, and anti-establishment stances.

Morrissey was born to working-class Irish immigrants in Davyhulme, Lancashire, England; the family lived in Queen's Court near Loreto convent in Hulme and his mother worked nearby at the Hulme Hippodrome bingo hall.

He formed the Smiths with Johnny Marr in 1982 and the band soon attracted national recognition for their eponymous debut album.

As the band's frontman, Morrissey attracted attention for his trademark quiff and witty and sardonic lyrics.

Deliberately avoiding rock machismo, he cultivated the image of a sexually ambiguous social outsider who embraced celibacy.

The Smiths released three further studio albums—Meat Is Murder, The Queen Is Dead, and Strangeways, Here We Come—and had a string of hit singles.

The band were critically acclaimed and attracted a cult following.

Personal differences between Morrissey and Marr resulted in the separation of the Smiths in 1987.

In 1988, Morrissey launched his solo career with Viva Hate.

In the mid-to-late 1990s, his albums Southpaw Grammar (1995) and Maladjusted (1997) also charted but were less well received.

This album and its follow-ups—Kill Uncle (1991), Your Arsenal (1992), and Vauxhall and I (1994)—all did well on the UK Albums Chart and spawned multiple hit singles.

He took on Alain Whyte and Boz Boorer as his main co-writers to replace Marr.

During this time his image began to shift into that of a burlier figure who toyed with patriotic imagery and working-class masculinity.

Relocating to Los Angeles, he took a musical hiatus from 1998 to 2003 before releasing a successful comeback album, You Are the Quarry, in 2004.

Ensuing years saw the release of albums Ringleader of the Tormentors (2006), Years of Refusal (2009), World Peace Is None of Your Business (2014), Low in High School (2017), California Son (2019), and I Am Not a Dog on a Chain (2020), as well as his autobiography and his debut novel, List of the Lost (2015).

Highly influential, Morrissey has been credited as a seminal figure in the emergence of indie pop, indie rock, and Britpop.

In a 2006 poll for the BBC's Culture Show, Morrissey was voted the second-greatest living British cultural icon.

His work has been the subject of academic study.

He has been a controversial figure throughout his music career due to his forthright opinions and outspoken nature, endorsing vegetarianism and animal rights and criticising royalty and prominent politicians.

He has also supported far-right activism with regard to British heritage, and defended a particular vision of national identity while critiquing the effects of immigration on the UK.