Johnny Marr reacts to Andy Burnham playing the Smiths with Ukrainian soldiers: “It’s a victory for the guitar”
Johnny Marr has reacted to a clip of UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham playing a Smiths song on guitar with Ukrainian soldiers during a recent trip to Kyiv.
The British PM recently made the trip to the Ukrainian capital to reaffirm the UK’s support for the country amid its ongoing war with Russia, and found himself among the Ukrainian military’s Cultural Forces division playing the Smiths’ Rusholme Ruffians with soldiers, in a video that has since gone viral.
READ MORE: Watch as UK PM Andy Burnham plays a Smiths song with Ukrainian soldiers in Kyiv: “You can take the man out of Manchester…”
Reacting to the video in a new appearance on Absolute Radio, Smiths guitar legend Johnny Marr praises Burnham, calling it a “victory for the guitar”.
“I think it’s an amazing thing. In all honesty, for me it’s like a victory for the guitar,” he says. “Just the way I’m wired, I always think like that. I can’t quite get my head around it. I don’t know whether pride is the word, but it probably is.
“It’s kind of beyond me to process it really, because it could be massive, that. But I just sort of go, ‘How great is the guitar?’ I think, what an amazing tool the guitar is.
“My overwhelming feeling was that it was a victory for the guitar. I know that this being political and obviously with the plight of Ukraine. The more I think about it the more I think about how insignificant I am in it, really. Marr concludes: “Good on him.”
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Rusholme Ruffians appeared on 1985’s Meat is Murder. Andy Burnham has made no secret of his love of guitar music during his time as a politician, and has touted his love of classic guitar bands including the Beatles, the Stone Roses, Radiohead and more.
During his jam with Ukrainian soldiers, the prime minister donned a T-style guitar from local Kyiv guitar company WM Guitars, but Burnham has previously displayed his love of Gretsch and Gibson guitars.
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Source: www.guitar-bass.net
