Mark James Morriss (born 18 October 1971) is an English

singer Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define singi ...

and

songwriter A songwriter is a person who creates musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music genre and film scoring. ...

, best known as the frontman for

The Bluetones The Bluetones are an English indie rock band, formed in Hounslow, Greater London, in 1993. The band's members are Mark Morriss on vocals, Adam Devlin on guitar, Mark's brother Scott Morriss on bass guitar, and Eds Chesters on drums. A fift ...

. He is the older brother of bandmate and bass player/illustrator Scott Morriss. He has released four solo albums, worked with

Matt Berry Matthew Charles Berry (born 2 May 1974) is an English actor, comedian, musician, and writer. Noted for his distinctive voice, he is best known for his television roles in comedy series such as ''The IT Crowd'', ''Garth Marenghi's Darkplace'', ' ...

's band The Maypoles and sung lead vocals on ''The Helicopter of the Holy Ghost'' project. When not touring with the Bluetones, he regularly plays solo acoustic shows across the UK.

Biography

Mark Morriss released his debut solo album, '' Memory Muscle'' in May 2008. A folk-tinged record, it featured five re-recorded tracks which had previously been released under the name "Fi-Lo Beddow" as a self-released EP in February 2006. The strings on the record were arranged by film composer

David Arnold David Arnold (born 23 January 1962) is an English film composer whose credits include scoring five James Bond films (1997-2008), as well as ''Stargate'' (1994), ''Independence Day'' (1996), ''Godzilla'' (1998), '' Shaft'' (2000), '' 2 Fast 2 F ...

, who became a fan of '' Expecting to Fly'' whilst scoring ''

Independence Day An independence day is an annual event memorialization, commemorating the anniversary of a nation's independence or Sovereign state, statehood, usually after ceasing to be a group or part of another nation or state, or after the end of a milit ...

''.

In 2014, Morriss released his second solo album ''A Flash of Darkness'' via Acid Jazz Records. This was followed by another Acid Jazz release in 2015, ''The Taste of Mark Morriss'', an album of cover versions. Morriss has also recorded the theme music for all of the children's audiobooks written by David Walliams. Morriss is also currently a full member of

's live band, The Maypoles, and regularly tours the UK with this outfit as a rhythm guitarist and backing vocalist. In 2021, Morriss appeared as the vocalist for Billy Reeves' The Helicopter of the Holy Ghost project, on the album ''Afters''. Morriss joined former theaudience member Reeves on the album, which was co-produced by Richard Archer of Hard-Fi, with the album also featuring members of Cocteau Twins, Engineers and Gazpacho.

Personal life

In November 2021, allegations of emotional and physical abuse against Morriss were made by his ex-wife, Anna Wharton. Morriss disputed the claims, telling ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'': "I may have been thoughtless and selfish in some of the dealings in my personal life of late, but these allegations of abuse and gaslighting are wholly untrue, and I refute them completely.” Following these allegations, Morriss was dropped from The Big Britpop Family Party in London. On 2 March 2022, Morriss issued a statement in response to his ex-wife's allegations.

Solo discography

EPs

* 2006 - '' The Fi-Lo Beddow EP''

Singles

* 2008 - " I'm Sick" * 2008 - " Lay Low" (download-only) * 2014 - "This Is The Lie (And That's The Truth)" * 2014 - "Space Cadet" * 2015 - "Lucretia (My Reflection)" * 2019 - "All The Wrong People" * 2019 - "The Beans"

Albums

* 2008 - '' Memory Muscle'' * 2014 - ''A Flash of Darkness'' (originally a Pledge campaign album, but reissued through the Acid Jazz label) * 2015 - ''The Taste of Mark Morriss'' * 2017 - ''Look Up'' (originally a Pledge campaign album, but reissued on vinyl in 2019 through the Reckless Yes label)

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Morriss, Mark 1971 births Living people English male songwriters English male singers People from Hounslow The Bluetones members Britpop musicians 21st-century English singers 21st-century British male singers Acid Jazz Records artists