The Thrills had been delighted to go for dinner with Morrissey. It was on a hazy afternoon two decades ago that the young Dublin band met with their celebrity fan at the Pig ’n Whistle on Hollywood Boulevard, a famed expat hangout in Los Angeles. It was going well. They were laughing, joking. Morrissey, who had suggested the group give him a call if they were passing through his adopted home, even floated the possibility of The Thrills supporting him on tour. But then things suddenly took a turn when the band’s guitarist made the faux pas of asking the Smiths frontman if he might be open to becoming an honorary Thrill.
“We knew Morrissey liked our song ‘One Horse Town’. He had put the demo version on the mixtape of his most recent tour,” recalls singer Conor Deasy. “We’re chatting, and Daniel, our guitarist, goes, ‘Morrissey, we’re just finishing up the mix to [the official studio version] ‘One Horse Town’. Would you like to do backing vocals?’ Morrissey said [adopts aloof ‘Moz’ voice], ‘I don’t do backing vocals’. There was a slight pause and then Daniel says, ‘What about singing the last chorus?’ And Morrissey goes, ‘I don’t do last choruses’. That was our introduction to Morrissey.”
