Johnny Marr is an English musician, songwriter, and singer (born Johnny Martin Maher) in Manchester in October 1963 and at the age of 13 formed his first band, the Paris Valentinos. He played in several bands, the most recent being Freak Party. But by early 1982, after losing their singer, Marr approached Rob Allman, the singer with White Dice. He showed little interest and instead suggested Steven Morrissey, the singer with the Nosebleeds. In May, and through a third-party it was arranged for Marr to meet Morrissey at his home. They seemed to hit it off and with Marr’s first bass player, Andy Rourke, and Mike Joyce on drums they formed the Smiths.
Within months they signed to Rough Trade Records and in May 1983 released their first single “Hand in Glove.” Now with an ever-growing fan base they recorded their first album, which was released in early 1984 and reached number two in the UK Chart. This was quickly followed by their second album, the controversial, “Meat is Murder.”
Their third album “The Queen Is Dead” was awarded the accolade by Spin magazine as being one of the greatest albums ever made. This resulted in the NME dubbing the Smiths the most important rock band of all time.
Marr's guitar sounds are instantly recognisable, with his jangly Rickenbacker and Fender Telecaster and synonymous with the Smith’s sound. Marr said, when performing with the band, he wanted to play a music which was pop. "100% of my focus was on providing interesting guitar hooks and putting some kind of space-age twist on the guitarist's role. The pop guitarist crossed with the mad professor. That's how I thought of myself."
In early 1986, Rourke was fired by the band for his use of heroin, but within weeks he was reinstated. But other problems were already looming and despite their continued success, personal differences within the band and the increasingly strained relationship between Morrissey and Marr created a huge problem.
Marr left the group in July 1987, and despite auditions to find a replacement no one was considered suitable. So, by the time their next tranche of music was released the band had long split.
One of the reasons given by Morrissey was the fact that Marr was working and recording with other artists, however, he later told Tim Samuels, a BBC journalist, that it was due to the lack of a managerial figure and business problems.
Marr's guitar playing had a massive effect on many of the Manchester bands that followed the Smiths including: John Squire - Stone Roses, Noel Gallagher - Oasis, and no doubt many more. He has since performed with numerous other bands and singers including: the Pretenders, Pet Shop Boys, collaborating with Hans Zimmer, on film soundtracks, Talking Heads. Joss Stone, Bryan Ferry and so many more.
In 2010 in a poll conducted by the BBC, Marr was voted the fourth-best guitarist of the last 30 years and Phil Alexander, editor-in-chief of Mojo described him as "arguably Britain's last great guitar stylist." In 2013, the NME, honoured Marr with its "Godlike Genius" award: "Not content with rewriting the history of music with one of the world's greatest ever bands, the Smiths, he's continued to push boundaries and evolve throughout his career, working with some of the best and most exciting artists on the planet."
Despite several attempts at reforming the Smiths it seems very unlikely.
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BY-------Graham Sclater
Giovanni Giorgio Moroder was born in Italy on 26th April 1940. But he is better known by his shortened name of Giorgio Moroder. When you mention his name to anyone many will know him as the Father of Disco and for discovering artists such as Boney M and Donna Summer. But he has done to much more and has been incredibly innovative across all areas and genres of music. Over the past thirty years the artists that Moroder has worked with, and touched, is incredible and is a who’s who of those in the music industry, and I make no apologies for listing so many of them in this article.
At the age of fifteen he taught himself guitar and three years later he toured Europe as a professional musician and began to record music using two Revox tape recorders where he no doubt learned the basics of production and recording. That gave him an insight into the recording process and put him in good stead for future his production work. He moved to Berlin and when he was twenty-five worked as a sound engineer resulting in him achieving several hit records in Germany. Two years later he moved to Munich where he soon set up his own record label, Oasis records.
However, he is better known for setting up his Musicland Studios in a basement, in Munich, which has been used by artists such as, The Rolling Stones, ELO, Led Zeppelin, Queen and Freddie Mercury, for his solo album, Elton John and so many more.
His success as a record producer really took off with recording of all the huge hits for Donna Summer while at the same time he recorded and released his own albums of synthesizer-driven music under the name, Music Machine.
This evolved into him writing and recording film soundtrack for Midnight Express, for which he won the Academy Award for Best original Score, and Golden Globe for Best original Score. His success continued with the scores for Superman III, Scarface, Top Gun and so many more, He also had hit singles, Never-Ending Story, which featured the voice of Limahl, from UK band, Kajagoogoo and Phil Oakey from Human League, with his hit, Electric Dreams.
His success continued with electronic based hits for Cher, Sparks, Bonnie Tyler and the Three Degrees, and once again so manty more.
His work on film scores led him to work with so many artists including: David Bowie, Kylie Minogue, Janet Jackson, Blondie, Berlin, Japan and so many more.
Many of the hits he wrote and produced were co-written with Pete Bellotte, which spawned the UK Number One, hit single, Son of My Father, for Chicory Tip
Understandably, he was totally committed to music for so many years and in the early nineties, he decided to take a step back from music. But in 2012 he returned and the following year he contributed to Daft Punk’s album, Random Access Memories and wrote and, or, produced the music for promo videos of major organisations including Volkswagen. He followed this with his own album, Déjà vu, when he collaborated with Kylie, Britney Spears and other artists.
In 2021 he returned to the studio, co-writing and producing two tracks with Duran Duran, Tonight United and Beautiful Lies for their album, Future Past.
Giorgio Moroder continues to enjoy his music and to date he has received so many accolades and in addition to three Academy Awards and four Golden Globes he has also received four Grammy Awards and more than 100 Golden and Platinum discs. In 2004 he was inducted into the Dance Music Hall of Fame.
Giorgio Moroder has certainly had a huge impact on music since his early years and long may it continue.
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