He's selling out shows on his legacy alone. If you informed ticket buyers on the next tour that he would be playing a setlist solely consisting of 19 new songs from the supposed "two unreleased albums fluttering against the bars" he's written, and made it abundantly clear there would be no Smiths songs or other solo songs played, I highly doubt he'd be selling out show after show.
Record companies don't care about legacy. They care about how much your last album sold. When you go from selling 400,000 records to 88,000 in a span of 5 years, no one is going to promote you like you're still a massive draw. Yet he expects that. The problem IS the new songs. They are weak in every way and fail to generate considerable buzz and demand even from his most devoted fans, so what would make him think a record company would show any interest? Any rational person would think the solution to a failure would be to go back to the drawing board and try again - not Morrissey...he thinks if he plays the same songs enough, you'll grow to like them. It also doesn't help that he consistently garners attention these days for absurdly negative comments. It actually seems like he does MORE publicity when trying to get a record deal than, you know, when he's actually supposed to be promoting an album/single.
Morrissey doesn't know his place...he expects the competitive music industry to take a step back in time to accommodate him, rather than him step aside, make a deal with an indie label that gives him complete freedom and enter the phase of his career where he releases material without the aim of getting it to the top of the charts. I honestly would respect him more if he were putting out bad music like he has for the last couple of years if I wasn't so sure he thought it was the best music of his career and worthy of being #1 on the charts.
Of course he's selling shows on the strength of his legacy, that's what having a legacy means. He's not a new artist, people know who he is by now and go to his shows because of it. How do you want people to go to a show on the basis of songs that they haven't heard yet and haven't been released?
It's the record company's job to heavily invest in the promotion of an album. What else do you need them for?
Morrissey is showing these days that he is still willing to do the leg work and do what it takes to promote a new album, but obviously it's easier for record companies to take some new act and promote the hell out of it, because they don't actually pay new acts anything and they can use them and do whatever they want with them.
With the stuff record companies have promoted over the decades, how can you say the songs are the most important factor in their considerations?
Morrissey has been in the same situation from 1997 to 2004, was it about the songs not being any good then?
A lot of other factors go into the equation. Timing is very important, as a new generation enters their teens, they discover his music, or there's a new wave of guitar bands or people cover his songs or use them in commercials or movies.
I think Morrissey believes record companies have let him down through the years with their promotion of his albums and he has a point. Was he ever a multi-platinum selling album, when he had hits? not really.
Whether he should change writing partners and/or producer, that's a different debate. I think a producer can make or break a song. The new songs have potential with the right producer.
