Why Such Negativity?

I agree with almost everything you said, but -

But when I consider his "common sense", his apparent loyalty to his mates, and the simple fact that he was much closer to Andy and Mike than Morrissey was, I tend to believe that Morrissey is due for more share of the blame than he is.

^ isn't his "common sense" and especially his closeness to Mike and Andy (the latter even being his schoolfriend) an aggravating circumstance, rather than extenuating?
 
isn't his "common sense" and especially his closeness to Mike and Andy (the latter even being his schoolfriend) an aggravating circumstance, rather than extenuating?

I'm not sure exactly what you mean, but if you're saying Marr should look worse, not better, for unfairly treating his friends, yes, I think that's true. To have joined with Morrissey to play games with the finances, keeping Mike and Andy in the dark, shows exactly the sort of ruthlessness people accuse Morrissey of having. Again, I'm admitting Marr didn't act totally honorably.

I think his treatment of Mike and Andy gets to a central part of Marr's personality which has been hinted at recently in other threads. Is Marr a "regular guy" who happens to be a good guitar player? Were he and Morrissey like oil and water? Or was Marr much more like Morrissey than has been let on? Seems like many people think Marr presents an image of being just another lad who at one time wound up in a strange partnership with a weirdo, whereas in fact he's a lot more like Morrissey than he lets on: smart, sensitive, less conventionally male, very artistically inclined, etc. I agree with that to an extent. But there's a bit more to it than that. As I perceive him, Marr is really both. One foot in one life, one foot in the other. Half eccentric artist, half regular bloke.

Because I see him that way, I think his treatment of Mike and Andy probably comes down to this duality. He knew he and Morrissey were the geniuses in the band, and while I know he thought highly of Mike and Andy as players (as he should, they're both incredible musicians) and even moreso as close friends, he probably agreed with Morrissey as far as distribution of the money. He may also have agreed with Morrissey that since they took on the burden of all the hard work behind the scenes that they therefore deserved a larger cut. But not without a divided conscience. Marr was definitely feeling intense pressure later in The Smiths. I'm sure some of that was caused by guilt over how some people were treated.

Could he have done something? I'm not sure. You're 19, 20, 21, fresh out of adolescence and the world is already calling you a rock savior, you know you're in a groove with a bona fide songwriting genius, and success has come so fast, so easily, that maybe you imagine that all the other details aren't as important, that everything will get sorted out at the end of the day. Maybe he thought they'd all get rich, and being rich Mike and Andy would never bother to scrutinize what M & M were doing. Above all, I think there was a bit of good old fashioned confusion. He and Morrissey weren't MBAs. They weren't managers. In the case it came out that Joyce, even upon receiving statements of profits in 1986, couldn't have figured them out. I doubt if Morrisey and Marr were any more qualified, and might have left some of the finer points in the hands of the accountants.

The whole situation was a clusterf*** from the word go. Just as Marr deserves more blame than he's getting, Morrissey deserves less. Neither of them probably knew what he was doing. I would expect the same to happen to anyone on their own in the music business. But more narrowly, in attempting to make sense of the case, I think it's fair to say that Morrissey deserves a bit more criticism than Marr for what happened. And Johnny must have suffered emotionally in a situation in which he knowingly kept money from his friends. (Joyce I'm not sure about, but I'll bet my "Interesting Drug" etched 12" that Marr personally apologized to Rourke.) It was an ugly but complicated ethical tangle. In the end I think Johnny had to account for what he did (or didn't do), which is why it's appropriate he lost the case and paid up. But no, morally speaking, I'm not willing to draw and quarter Marr for what he did to his friends. Chalk it up to being young, famous, and talented-- too much too soon.
 
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Johnny Marr:

"The Smiths was me and Morrissey. It was me and Morrissey at the start. When we brought in Mike and Andy, it was made clear to them. It was unusual for the whole focus of the group to be around a songwriting team, but that was fundamental to the Smiths' ethic. When I went round to see Andy to ask him to join the group, I laid out the terms to be fair. I wanted this to be a new group with a realistic outlook. Myself and Morrissey had already started writing songs. At the initial meeting with Joe, we said if we can't find the right musicians, then we'll write songs a la Brill Building writers. We had all that space. Morrissey was saying, "I'd like to write a song for Sandie Shaw". That was the way we felt. For my part, it was the Leiber/Stoller, Jagger/Richard, Lennon/McCartney vibe.
So from day one, Mike and Andy knew they didn't have to do 25% of the work in every area. That was the understanding. They could leave the studio whenever they were finished, and we couldn't. They could. We were the ones who had to deal with shit with Joe, shit with Scott and shit with Rough Trade. It suited Mike and Andy right down to the ground, because it was me and Morrissey that ran the group, and who physically did all the things except play live. All of us played live. In the studio, it was all of us doing the tapes, but everybody else skedaddled when their bit of work was done, whereas me and Morrissey were together every single day."

This is a direct quote. So either this is true and Morrissey and Johnny were in the right. Or else Johnny is a blatant liar and not at all someone who was confused and got things wrong because he was so naive.
 
I've read that before, Danny. It just states Marr's position, which we knew already: they did all the work, they deserve 40/40.

I'm sympathetic to Morrissey and Marr. I don't question Marr's description of how the lion's share of work fell to them and not Joyce or Rourke. They deserved 40/40 all the way, and Rourke and Joyce should have been happy to have been along for the ride. Legally, though, they didn't protect themselves because the business side of The Smiths was muddled. M & M behaved like they thought they were untouchable, that Rourke and Joyce were lesser members-- fine, but that didn't lessen their obligation to run the operation as cleanly and transparently as they could. Why was no contract signed? If Joyce and Rouke understood the situation, they would have been comfortable signing away their 25% so long as they could "skedaddle" when they wanted-- so why didn't they? Why did Morrissey withhold money from the others "because they weren't interested"? If matters were as clear as Marr says, Joyce wouldn't have had a case. But he did.
 
I'm not sure exactly what you mean, but if you're saying Marr should look worse, not better, for unfairly treating his friends, yes, I think that's true. To have joined with Morrissey to play games with the finances, keeping Mike and Andy in the dark, shows exactly the sort of ruthlessness people accuse Morrissey of having. Again, I'm admitting Marr didn't act totally honorably.

I think his treatment of Mike and Andy gets to a central part of Marr's personality which has been hinted at recently in other threads. Is Marr a "regular guy" who happens to be a good guitar player? Were he and Morrissey like oil and water? Or was Marr much more like Morrissey than has been let on? Seems like many people think Marr presents an image of being just another lad who at one time wound up in a strange partnership with a weirdo, whereas in fact he's a lot more like Morrissey than he lets on: smart, sensitive, less conventionally male, very artistically inclined, etc. I agree with that to an extent. But there's a bit more to it than that. As I perceive him, Marr is really both. One foot in one life, one foot in the other. Half eccentric artist, half regular bloke.

Because I see him that way, I think his treatment of Mike and Andy probably comes down to this duality. He knew he and Morrissey were the geniuses in the band, and while I know he thought highly of Mike and Andy as players (as he should, they're both incredible musicians) and even moreso as close friends, he probably agreed with Morrissey as far as distribution of the money. He may also have agreed with Morrissey that since they took on the burden of all the hard work behind the scenes that they therefore deserved a larger cut. But not without a divided conscience. Marr was definitely feeling intense pressure later in The Smiths. I'm sure some of that was caused by guilt over how some people were treated.

Could he have done something? I'm not sure. You're 19, 20, 21, fresh out of adolescence and the world is already calling you a rock savior, you know you're in a groove with a bona fide songwriting genius, and success has come so fast, so easily, that maybe you imagine that all the other details aren't as important, that everything will get sorted out at the end of the day. Maybe he thought they'd all get rich, and being rich Mike and Andy would never bother to scrutinize what M & M were doing. Above all, I think there was a bit of good old fashioned confusion. He and Morrissey weren't MBAs. They weren't managers. In the case it came out that Joyce, even upon receiving statements of profits in 1986, couldn't have figured them out. I doubt if Morrisey and Marr were any more qualified, and might have left some of the finer points in the hands of the accountants.

The whole situation was a clusterf*** from the word go. Just as Marr deserves more blame than he's getting, Morrissey deserves less. Neither of them probably knew what he was doing. I would expect the same to happen to anyone on their own in the music business. But more narrowly, in attempting to make sense of the case, I think it's fair to say that Morrissey deserves a bit more criticism than Marr for what happened. And Johnny must have suffered emotionally in a situation in which he knowingly kept money from his friends. (Joyce I'm not sure about, but I'll bet my "Interesting Drug" etched 12" that Marr personally apologized to Rourke.) It was an ugly but complicated ethical tangle. In the end I think Johnny had to account for what he did (or didn't do), which is why it's appropriate he lost the case and paid up. But no, morally speaking, I'm not willing to draw and quarter Marr for what he did to his friends. Chalk it up to being young, famous, and talented-- too much too soon.

I think that your points about Marr's personality and Morrissey/Marr relationship are spot on. I've always had the impression that Marr halfway between Morrissey and 'ordinary boys', Mike and Andy, and that he was the glue that kept the band together. I don't think that Marr is more to blame than Morrissey (if you think that Marr & Morrissey should be blamed, that is), and I don't want to come off as a Marr basher - I like him and he seems to be a nice person. I was just trying to restore the balance, so to speak.

You did understand what I was trying to say - if Mike and Andy were unfairly treated, Marr would look worse just for the reason that, unlike Morrissey, he was their friend. That doesn't imply that he should objectively be blamed more than Morrissey, but I think that Andy and Mike might expect more from him than they would from Morrissey. And, unlike Morrissey, who was 100% sure that he is right, Marr might have felt that he had to provide excuses. Besides, communicating with Joyce and Rourke a lot more than Morrissey did, Marr ahould be the one in the position to know what those two knew or didn't know about the financial arrangements. However Marr's "guilty" or "innocent" Marr might actually have been, he seems to have felt the need to defend himself more than anyone else did. Most of the things he has said in public after the breakup seemed like his attempts to show that he wasn't the one to be blamed - first for the breakup of the band, and later for the court case. And as it happens, he did it by making Morrissey look bad.
 
I've read that before, Danny. It just states Marr's position, which we knew already: they did all the work, they deserve 40/40.

I'm sympathetic to Morrissey and Marr. I don't question Marr's description of how the lion's share of work fell to them and not Joyce or Rourke. They deserved 40/40 all the way, and Rourke and Joyce should have been happy to have been along for the ride. Legally, though, they didn't protect themselves because the business side of The Smiths was muddled. M & M behaved like they thought they were untouchable, that Rourke and Joyce were lesser members-- fine, but that didn't lessen their obligation to run the operation as cleanly and transparently as they could. Why was no contract signed? If Joyce and Rouke understood the situation, they would have been comfortable signing away their 25% so long as they could "skedaddle" when they wanted-- so why didn't they? Why did Morrissey withhold money from the others "because they weren't interested"? If matters were as clear as Marr says, Joyce wouldn't have had a case. But he did.

He had a case because there was no written contract and under the law that means the contract was one of equal partners unless you can prove otherwise. Morrissey and Marr's case rested on the fact that they could prove otherwise because Joyce and Rourke had accepted 10% for five years. They thought they could prove through Joyce and Rourke's actions that it was a verbal contract. Joyce and Rourke's case rested on them claiming that they had never been told they only got 10% so there was no verbal contract. It came down to who the judge believed.

The money was held back once court proceedings were begun. The money from the partnership was frozen. There was never a plot between Morrissey and Marr to deprive the others of their 10% as you imply. This was never claimed in court. If it was, the whole case would have been a much bigger story in the press.
 
He had a case because there was no written contract and under the law that means the contract was one of equal partners unless you can prove otherwise. Morrissey and Marr's case rested on the fact that they could prove otherwise because Joyce and Rourke had accepted 10% for five years. They thought they could prove through Joyce and Rourke's actions that it was a verbal contract. Joyce and Rourke's case rested on them claiming that they had never been told they only got 10% so there was no verbal contract. It came down to who the judge believed.

The money was held back once court proceedings were begun. The money from the partnership was frozen. There was never a plot between Morrissey and Marr to deprive the others of their 10% as you imply. This was never claimed in court. If it was, the whole case would have been a much bigger story in the press.

To be honest I do think (and its not just because I was on Moz/Marr's side) that the judge lost all credibily with those soundbite 'deviant..' comments. They were there for the blantant purpose so that journalist could use them and it's pretty low when judges do that and it usually shows a personal imput
 
More on Johnny's statement, above.

I was thinking about what he said and I realized that there's a huge problem with his account of how much more work he and Morrissey did than Rourke and Joyce. They did the heavy lifting, while the rhythm section went off for a pint. I haven't seen anyone mention the problem with that idea before. It's this: weren't Morrissey and Marr, as songwriters, producers, and often de facto managers expected to spend the long hours in the studio and elsewhere, and weren't they paid more for those roles?

But as it turns it out, that doesn't matter. Read this legal briefing on Morrissey's failed appeal. It's the most informative you'll read on the court case.

http://www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup.cgi?doc=/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/1998/1711.html&query=joyce

This is the key line:

"Partnership law [states] that the fact that one or more partners makes a greater contribution than others in no way displaces the presumption of equality: see Lindley & Banks (17th Edition) para 19-22: "Whether, therefore, partners have contributed money equally or unequally, whether or not they are on a par as regards skill, connection or character, whether they have or have not laboured equally for the benefit of the firm, their shares will be considered equal, unless some agreement to the contrary can be shown to have been entered into."​

Danny, you say it came down to Judge Weeks believing Morrissey and Marr, but what do you make of his reasons? For example, the supposed meeting at the Wool Hall in which Rourke said "We get 10%" and Joyce silently assented. Didn't you think the judge had reason to toss that? What about the Pluto Studios meeting? A few other meetings, like the Top of the Pops night and Joyce's asking for 25% to be manager, could have been believed, but overall I think the judge made the correct legal decision.

And the withheld money I'm referring to wasn't the full 10%, and I wasn't saying he was basically stealing from them. It was reported that he kept back a lot of money because they "weren't interested". The Daily Telegraph of 12/12/96: "The singer told the court he kept back nearly £500,000 in royalties because other band members 'weren't interested in business'".
 
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More on Johnny's statement, above.

I was thinking about what he said and I realized that there's a huge problem with his account of how much more work he and Morrissey did than Rourke and Joyce. They did the heavy lifting, while the rhythm section went off for a pint. I haven't seen anyone mention the problem with that idea before. It's this: weren't Morrissey and Marr, as songwriters, producers, and often de facto managers expected to spend the long hours in the studio and elsewhere, and weren't they paid more for those roles?

But as it turns it out, that doesn't matter. Read this legal briefing on Morrissey's failed appeal. It's the most informative you'll read on the court case.

http://www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup.cgi?doc=/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/1998/1711.html&query=joyce

This is the key line:

"Partnership law [states] that the fact that one or more partners makes a greater contribution than others in no way displaces the presumption of equality: see Lindley & Banks (17th Edition) para 19-22: "Whether, therefore, partners have contributed money equally or unequally, whether or not they are on a par as regards skill, connection or character, whether they have or have not laboured equally for the benefit of the firm, their shares will be considered equal, unless some agreement to the contrary can be shown to have been entered into."​

Danny, you say it came down to Judge Weeks believing Morrissey and Marr, but what do you make of his reasons? For example, the supposed meeting at the Wool Hall in which Rourke said "We get 10%" and Joyce silently assented. Didn't you think the judge had reason to toss that? What about the Pluto Studios meeting? A few other meetings, like the Top of the Pops night and Joyce's asking for 25% to be manager, could have been believed, but overall I think the judge made the correct legal decision.

And the withheld money I'm referring to wasn't the full 10%, and I wasn't saying he was basically stealing from them. It was reported that he kept back a lot of money because they "weren't interested". The Daily Telegraph of 12/12/96: "The singer told the court he kept back nearly £500,000 in royalties because other band members 'weren't interested in business'".

The fact is the judge didn't come to a "legal decision". As in most court cases in the final analysis it came down to who he believed in the end. Did he believe that Rourke and Joyce were told they were only getting 10% or not? It was their word against Morrissey's and Marr's. If he had believed that they had known they were getting 10% and carried on working for the band on that basis even if they disagreed with it he would have had no choice but to find in Morrissey and Marr's favour because by carrying on in their positions they would have been agreeing to the "contract". It came down to who he thought came across as most believable in court.

As far as the money held back is concerned we don't get told by the Telegraph at what point this money was held back. Certainly in the appeal it was stated that the accounts were in order and during the Smiths lifetime Rourke and Joyce received a quarter of what Morrissey and Marr received. So the Telegraph may have misinterpreted the freezing of the assets once legal proceedings were started as Morrissey keeping back the money from the others. I prefer to read the appeal rather than newspaper reports. The appeal doesn't mention any shady dealings about money being withheld from anyone. I would have thought if it were true it would be an important factor in the credibility of Morrissey as a witness and would be raised as a pertinent point. I also think he might have been charged with fraud.
 
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