Simon Goddard is a British music journalist and author, best known for his writings on British indie band The Smiths and their former lead singer Morrissey.
In 2002 Goddard's first book on The Smiths was published by the small Surrey-based imprint Reynolds & Hearn. Entitled Songs That Saved Your Life it analysed in depth the making of every one of their songs, both released and unreleased and borrowed its format from Ian MacDonald's Beatles book, Revolution in the Head: The Beatles' Records and the Sixties. The book was updated in 2004 to include new interview material from Smiths founder and guitarist Johnny Marr.
Goddard's second book called Mozipedia - The Encyclopedia of Morrissey and The Smiths was published in the UK by Ebury Press/Random House in August 2009. The book is a 350,000 word alphabetical index of Morrissey and his world, described by one reviewer as "the undertaking of a maniac"[1] and by another as "the next best thing to Morrissey's autobiography (when he actually writes it)."[2] Mozipedia was voted Best Book of 2009 by the readers of Mojo magazine.[3] The American edition of Mozipedia was published by Plume through Penguin/Viking on 28 September 2010.
As a journalist Goddard has written for Q, Uncut and various other magazines and newspapers. He is the great-great-great nephew of the Victorian artist and designer George Charles Haité and prior to journalism studied fine art. In 1995 he directed and designed the promo video for Edwyn Collins' single "If You Could Love Me". [4] His brother is the television director Andy Goddard.