Morrissey’s 11th solo album finds him on his own label, squelching with newfound keys on songs like Spent the Day in Bed, and riffing on favoured themes: loneliness and world affairs. As ever, the messages are mixed, on many levels. Bodily pleas for comfort – “I just want my face in your lap” runs In Your Lap – vie with come-ons. “Wrap your legs around my face”, invites Home Is a Question Mark. It all goes south, however, on the orchestral mariachi of When You Open Your Legs. Morrissey’s broadsides – against police violence, for example – are let down by misfiring attempts at electronic rock and a less-than-compassionate worldview that undermines the moral authority he once had.
