Morrissey has seen the release of his latest album, Low in High School, derailed by a serious of unfortunate comments. In a pair of recent interviews, one with Germany’s Der Spiegel and another with The Times of London, the singer seemingly questioned whether the tidal wave of sexual misconduct charges made against Kevin Spacey, Harvey Weinstein, and others was a sort of witch hunt. “Some people are very awkward when it comes to romance,” he was quoted telling Der Spiegel. “You must be careful as far as ‘sexual harassment’ is concerned because often it can be just a pathetic attempt at courtship,” he added to The Times. He also told Der Spiegel that he would kill Donald Trump “for the safety of humanity.”
In the weeks since, Morrissey has sought to clean up his comments, penning a Facebook post in which he assured his fans that he did not support pedophilia while calling on Der Spiegel to release the unedited audio of his comments, believing they were taken out of context. (The audio has since been released and it didn’t really help his case.)
Now, Morrissey has filmed an eight-minute YouTube vlog in which he chides the “hateful press” for “purposefully” derailing the release of Low in High School. “It seems to me that, in the first place, they get very angry or very excited if you stop to say something that people are listening to or that reflect the will of the people. They get very nervous. They won’t allow it. They shut it down and so forth,” he says.
“They’re not listening to the music. They’re not listening to anything, really. They see my name, and they want to get rid of it as quickly as possible. And as I said, in many ways, they do succeed. There’s not really that much you can do about it. You have to live with it,” he goes on the add.
Morrissey also reveals that his comments about Trump resulted in a visit from the Secret Service, and though they “were very very nice … Whether I’m allowed free access to America, I really don’t know. I have to see if I can enter the country again.”
The vlog, which is dubbed “Morrissey’s State of the Union Address,” also reveals that the singer has a “virulent flu virus,” which explains why he canceled the remainder of his US tour. That said, he was well enough to perform for a recent installment of CBS This Morning, which you can replay here.