On Tuesday, Johnny Marr dropped his debut solo album,The Messenger. The former Smiths guitarist says that while he has enjoyed being a part of Electronic, The The, Modest Mouse and The Cribs, he feels that the time was right to go it alone.

"I didn't have a burning ambition to bear my soul as a solo artist," he tells Billboard.  "It wasn't that I wanted to go backwards or get nostalgic or return to my roots, but I found myself playing and thinking in a way that was not unlike the way I did it when I first started out…and just started to write songs really quickly."

Marr will be hitting the road next month to promote The Messenger, and he reveals that fans can expect to hear a wide variety tracks on the upcoming tour.  "There's quite a lot of old songs that I like to sing now that just make for a good feeling in a show," he notes.  "I feel like I've earned the right to look back at those songs, some I've done with Electronic, some I've done with The The, some of The Smiths, of course.”

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