Johnny Marr Rips Donald Trump For Playing Smiths Songs at Rallies

Lars Brandle
·2 min read
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Please, please, please stop. Johnny Marr, the iconic guitarist with British ‘80s indie icons the Smiths, has called out Donald Trump’s campaign for using the band’s “Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want” during rallies.

Marr and frontman Morrisey co-wrote the melancholy number, which originally appeared as the b-side of the 1984 single “William, It Was Really Nothing,” and was later included in compilations Hatful of Hollow and Louder Than Bombs.

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The song, however, should never be included in Trump rallies, Marr insists.

“Ahh…right…OK,” he writes on social media, responding to video confirmation captured at a Trump rally last year in South Dakota. “I never in a million years would’ve thought this could come to pass. Consider this s— shut right down right now.”

Others posters on X (formerly Twitter) claim that the Smiths’ music has been used to warm-up crowds at multiple Trump rallies recently, including at his event in Laconia, New Hampshire on Monday (Jan. 22).

Across his political career, Trump has fallen foul with a growing list of recording artists. The Rolling Stones, Phil Collins, Linkin Park, John Fogerty, Neil Young, R.E.M., Rihanna, Pharrell, Guns N’ Roses, Steven Tyler and the estates of Leonard Cohen and Tom Petty are among the many artists who’ve issued cease and desist letters to Trump and the former president’s team for using their works at rallies and for campaigns without consent.

The Smiths released just four albums from 1984 until their acrimonious split in 1987: The Smiths (1984), Meat Is Murder (1985), The Queen Is Dead (1986) and Strangeways, Here We Come (1987). Each is considered a classic.

Marr, with his jangly guitar style that influenced a generation of indie artists, has been busy ever since, as bandleader with Johnny Marr and the Healers, working with Neil Finn, the Cribs, Modest Mouse and other creative projects. He belatedly launched his solo career in 2013 with The Messenger, the first of his five successive top 10 appearances on the Official U.K. Albums Chart.

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