Rocker Johnny Marr: Trump, Brexit are ‘the Virus of Right-Wing Ideology Spreading Through the Western World’

Former The Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr says his new album was inspired by Brexit, President Donald Trump, and “the virus of right-wing ideology that is spreading through the nervous system of the Western world.”

“We brought a bunch of old projectors and lights and gadgets to keep me inspired,” Marr told Rolling Stone while discussing the creative process behind the album, “Call the Comet,” which explores an “alternative society” and is set in the “not-too-distant future.”

“Sometimes we’d have different news feeds projected onto the wall: Al Jazeera, Fox, the BBC and French news. Other times it would be wildlife films or just the swirling cosmos,” the English rocker said.

Brexit and the election of Trump inspired the album, as well as the election of President Trump. The album’s eighth song, “Bug,” features lyrics like “Everybody feels the aching/Population is sick and shaking.”

The track, Marr said, “is about the virus of right-wing ideology that is spreading through the nervous system of the Western world.”

Another song on the album was inspired by the 2016 Islamic terror attack in Nice, France.

Marr’s former bandmate, The Smiths frontman Morrissey, has been openly supportive of Brexit, while in 2017, he criticized politicians for refusing to admit that Islamic extremism was behind the Manchester terrorist attack.

In December, Morrissey attacked the “hateful media,” and declared, “It seems to me that in England at the moment, the right-wing has adopted a left-wing stance, and the left-wing has adopted a right-wing stance.”