Morrissey has caused controversy in the US after making on-stage comments that he wished President Bush was dead.

American fans launched a tirade against the former Smiths singer after the Manchester Evening News website reported his comments.

Morrissey announced the death of former President Ronald Reagan from the stage of a show in Dublin and allegedly added that he wished Bush had died instead.

Since putting the story up on its official website, the paper claims to have been deluged with messages, mostly from the US.

“More tastelessness and idiocy from across the Atlantic,” said Jean Shaw in San Francisco. “If it were the other way around (Americans cheering the death of a foreign leader), we’d never hear the end of it.”

“He has the right to say anything he wishes. It just sounds so much like Osama,” wrote Lee Hempfling from Phoenix, Arizona.

But Evan Woods from Los Angeles, countered: “Morrissey obviously does not bow before the flag, like so many Americans, and religiously honour anyone who has ever held a position of power.”

A spokesman for Morrissey’s record company, Sanctuary Records, said: “Morrissey was just alerting the audience to the fact that Ronald Reagan had died.

“He then simply followed that up with his comment about about George Bush, which was his own opinion. He is no stranger to controversy.”

Credit: Ananova