Single Review: Morrissey - Make-Up Is A Lie

We haven't heard from Morrissey (at least musically) in several years, as controversy and spite had reportedly led to several full albums being shelved, because no suitable contract to release them could be reached. Who blinked first is not known, but Morrissey and the world have come to terms, and a new album will be arriving in early March. To 'celebrate' this liberation of his music, the first new Morrissey song in years is upon us.

If you can look past the absolute tripe of the photograph chosen as the cover, what we get is a song that echoes that laziness and bad decision making. This is not a lyrical statement, nor is it a bop of a song. "You Have Killed Me" was not a masterpiece of literature when it signaled "Ringleader Of The Tormentors", but it had a compelling guitar hook and a singable chorus. This song, by contrast, is the pencil sketch before the thick black ink is applied to the outlines of a paint-by-numbers template.

The production is a thin warble of electronics that have no power, the limited frequencies highlighting the age in Morrissey's voice. He strains and cracks to deliver a lyric that is barely a lyric. He thinks he is telling a story about the Paris art scene, but the verses are so bare-bones they only say that the narrator is in Paris and with a poet. No other context, no other details. That poet then says "make-up is a lie" again and again, with no further explanation, nor anything to break up the monotony.

It might be argued this is Morrissey's take on the way society views beauty and aging, but that would be us giving him credit for something he isn't saying. There is no insight in the lyric, no commentary about the hypocrisy of men like him being able to get gray and stupid without the same standards being applied, and no indication he's thought this through on a level deeper than the layers of powder and foundation he is singing about. He doesn't wrestle with the implications of women needing to wear a cosmetic mask to garner the attention and approval of society, nor does he even bother to say he prefers people in their natural state. When the third 'verse' mentions seeing those words on the woman's gravestone, it is clear Morrissey is one of those people who would read an epitaph and believe that tells him enough to claim to know the heart of the person they speak for.

I have written before that Morrissey's reputation as a lyricist may have never been deserved at all, but certainly should have been called into question over these last twenty-plus years of tedious and terrible language. "You Are The Quarry" was twenty years ago now, and looking back at the start of Morrissey's 'comeback' is an exercise in how low we set the bar once it has already been cleared. That album featured childish insults, petty whining, and the general stench of someone whose head has been lodged firmly in their own ass. It also featured the one insightful song Morrissey has written in all this time, and the few true melodies he bothered to sing, so the problems were overlooked. With no poetry, no insight, and no melody, Morrissey has nothing left to distract us with.

The only way this song is interesting at all is to consider the title snark, and that the idea of Morrissey making up with the world at large is a joke upon us. Morrissey has, for years, given the impression of being nothing but a musical shit-poster, and if this is a genuine effort to put his best foot forward after years of being rendered irrelevant, it would be yet sadder. The part that angers me is not that Morrissey is disappointing me, because I don't actually care if he ever releases another song I enjoy or not, but that I've already read many fans speaking rhapsodic about this song and this vocal. How? Why? Where can I get lobotomized the way they have?

Listening to this song, and considering the last two or three Morrissey albums, I'm struck by this thought; Is it better to be thought a washed-up asshole, or open your mouth and remove all doubt? That is the question...