Ian Svenonius is hopping mad.

 MAKE-UP IS A LIE track listing

1. “You’re Right, It’s Time”
2. “Make-up is a Lie”
3. “Notre-Dame”
4. “Amazona” (Roxy Music cover)
5. “Headache”
6. “Boulevard”
7. “Zoom Zoom the Little Boy”
8. “The Night Pop Dropped”
9. “Kerching Kerching”
10. “Lester Bangs”
11. “Many Icebergs Ago”
12. “The Monsters of Pig Alley”

Apparently, the song "Make-up is a lie" is about the Manchester Arena attack, though the action appears to take place in Paris. It DOES contain the word "explosion", which Morrissey rhymes with "reclusion". I've heard of "blank verse" but I get precisely NOTHING from these words, though Morrissey would probably complain that that was my fault. The chorus is just the title repeated with varying stresses, and then going slightly up at the end to suggest "this is the end of the chorus now". 

 I'm a songwriter. I'm not placing myself in the same category as Morrissey. I was never the voice of a generation. I was the voice of a wet Wednesday afternoon. But it was a very long wet Wednesday afternoon, and I applied myself, and one of the things I learned was the laziest way of writing a chorus is just repeating the title four to six times, with slightly different stresses and a bit at the end that's like an aural semi-colon. I mean you can do it, but it's not a story, it doesn't take you anywhere. It's like getting a high-lighter pen out. THIS IS THE NAME OF THE SONG. Not "this is what the song's about", because you could look at the words of this song for a million years and never imagine it's about the Manchester Arena bombing - England's 9/11, according to Moz. You might imagine it was some tingly manosphere bait, something that hates women for wanting to look good. But no, it's much cleverer than that. I don't know why, but it is. It's about Manchester, where Morrissey is from, so it affects him personally, even though it seems to be about a woman in Paris. Unless Paris is where immigrant Muslims are holed up or something and it's about immigration, cause the small boats are French, aren't they, and that'll set us up nicely for whatever Notre Dame is going to be about. Charlie Hebdo, probably. 

The titles: Zoom Zoom The Little Boy, Kerching Kerching (I wonder if Mike Joyce will appear in this one) Many Icebergs Ago, The Monsters of Pig Alley. 

The Monsters of Pig Alley! I mean, he used to be good at this sort of thing, didn't he? Didn't he? Was that a dream? How can a song called The Monsters of Pig Alley be good? Even if the music is fucking Beethoven's Seventh it's still going to be called The Monsters of Pig Alley, and it's still going to be a mean-spirited, peevish tirade against one of his perceived enemies, probably someone who works for a record company who has slighted him by not kowtowing to his every whim. Sire are putting this record out, his first for them since, I think, Southpaw Grammar in 1995. He still has Bonfire of the Teenagers - strong title - knocking about too. I doubt it'll come out on Sire. I think Stephen has "one and done" printed on every contract now. 

Anyway, I'm probably not going to listen to this record. I don't think I've heard new Moz product since Ringleader of the Tormentors - strong title - and I doubt The Monsters of Pig Alley will change that.