Morrissey has been dropped by his label BMG Records, according to a post on his website Morrissey Central.
A statement on the site revealed that all “projected BMG Morrissey releases/reissues have been scrapped.”
“BMG Records have dropped Morrissey,” the post read. “Following the March 2020 release of I AM NOT A DOG ON A CHAIN (#1 Scotland, #1 Poland, #3 Britain, #3 France, #10 Spain, #13 Germany, #2, #9, #17, #18 U.S.A. – depending on which official chart you follow), BMG have appointed a new Executive who does not want another Morrissey album.
“Instead, the new BMG Executive has announced new plans for ‘diversity’ within BMG’s artist roster, and all projected BMG Morrissey releases/reissues have been scrapped.”
Responding to the news, Morrissey said: “This news is perfectly in keeping with the relentless galvanic horror of 2020.” He added: “We would be critically insane to expect anything positive.
“My three albums with BMG have been the best of my career, and I stand by them till death. Recording them has been a pivotal period in my life, and I thank the previous BMG team and everyone involved for that. It’s still important to me to do music my own way, and I wouldn’t want to be on a label that dictates so specifically how their artists should behave – especially when the word ‘talent’ is notably never mentioned.”
The statement concludes with a quote said to be from BMG UK president Alistair Norbury: “There are too many cases of successful artists languishing at labels who are no longer interested in them.”
Morrissey’s Las Vegas residency will remain in place for 2021.
Filmed at the Inglewood Forum in Los Angeles on February 6, 1991, the two artists’ T-Rex cover was officially released on streaming services on Friday (November 13).
An edited and upgraded performance video of Morrissey and Bowie performing ‘Cosmic Dancer’, which was overseen in LA by Tim Broad, has also been released