{"id":116904,"date":"2025-09-04T00:07:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-04T00:07:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/116904\/"},"modified":"2025-09-04T00:07:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-04T00:07:09","slug":"morrissey-wants-to-sell-you-his-stake-in-the-smiths","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/116904\/","title":{"rendered":"Morrissey Wants to Sell You His Stake in the Smiths"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Morrissey <\/p>\n

\n Is he the drama?
\n Photo: Jim Dyson\/Getty Images\n <\/p>\n

We are shocked \u2014 shocked! \u2014 to find Morrissey<\/a> being dramatic online. The former Smiths front man issued a blog on his website titled \u201cA Soul for Sale<\/a>,\u201d offering his stake in the band to the highest bidder. \u201cI am burnt out by any and all connections to Marr, Rourke, Joyce. I have had enough of malicious associations,\u201d Morrissey said in a statement. \u201cI would now like to live disassociated from those who wish me nothing but ill-will and destruction, and this is the only resolution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Morrissey says he can sell you:<\/p>\n

\u27bd The name \u201cThe Smiths,\u201d as created by Morrissey.
\u27bd All Smiths artwork, as created by Morrissey.
\u27bd All Smiths merchandising rights.
\u27bd All Smiths songs lyrically \/ musically.
\u27bd All synchronisation rights.
\u27bd All Smiths recordings.
\u27bd All contractual rights for Smiths publishing.<\/p>\n

This comes after Morrissey previously claimed his ex-bandmate Johnny Marr<\/a> filed to trademark the Smiths \u201cwithout any consultation.\u201d In September 2024<\/a>, Morrissey said Marr blocked the release of a new Smiths best-of box set. \u201cWarner approached Morrissey and [sleeve designer] Darren Evans to assemble artwork for all four releases, all of which were rejected and halted out of hand by J Marr,\u201d Morrissey wrote on his website.<\/p>\n

Through reps, Marr refuted Mozz\u2019s claims<\/a>. \u201cIn 2018, following an attempt by a third party to use the Smiths\u2019 name \u2014 and upon discovery that the trademark was not owned by the band \u2014 Marr reached out to Morrissey via his representatives, to work together in protecting the Smiths\u2019 name,\u201d a spokesperson said. Morrissey allegedly failed to respond to Marr\u2019s overtures, so Marr trademarked the band\u2019s name himself. \u201cAs a gesture of goodwill, in January 2024, Marr signed an assignment of joint ownership to Morrissey,\u201d the spokesperson continued. \u201cExecution of this document still requires Morrissey to sign.\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad\u201d So Mozz maybe own\u2019s half of the Smiths, if he ever signed Marr\u2019s contract. Anyway, if you want to buy whatever rights to the Smiths Morrissey owns, there\u2019s a Gmail account you can contact. It\u2019s on Morrissey\u2019s blog, below a weirdly pixelated still from The Last Picture Show. <\/p>\n

Related<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Is he the drama? Photo: Jim Dyson\/Getty Images We are shocked \u2014 shocked! \u2014 to find Morrissey being…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":116905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[64,63,134,82714,82713,136,82712,82716,82715],"class_list":{"0":"post-116904","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-johnny-marr","12":"tag-morrissey","13":"tag-music","14":"tag-sheila-take-a-bow","15":"tag-smiths","16":"tag-the-smiths"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=116904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/116905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=116904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=116904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=116904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}