Morrissey “The Last of the Famous International Playboys” 1989. 12″ single. Today, May 22nd, is Morrissey’s birthday (b. Steven Patrick Morrissey, 1959). “The Last of the Famous International Playboys” is Morrissey’s third solo single after the dissolution of The Smiths, however fellow Smiths musicians Andy Rourke (bass) and Mike Joyce (drums) play on the single. The song went to #6 in the UK and #3 on the US Alternative chart. Like many of Morrissey’s songs, the music is relatively bright and sunny while the lyrics are…not so much. The track is about infamous 1960′s London gangsters Reggie and Ronnie Kray, the murders, the fame. “The Last of the Famous International Playboys” appears on the Morrissey 1990 comp Bona Drag. The b-side of this 12″ has “Lucky Lisp” (Rourke and Joyce play on this track, too and it is also on Bona Drag) and “Michaels Bones” which is more in the depressing-Morrissey mode. The cover art is a photo of Morrissey at 7 years old, wedged in the crook of a tree.