Morrissey Concert Review 2004-11-11

Tonight was amazing.

First, dinner with a coworker. We discussed interview questions for engineers as we are at heart nerds. I gave him mine and he gave me his. We enjoy brain teasers. The Hyatt in Beverly Hills is, finally, a place that respects me.

And then, off to Universal City to see Morrissey!

The taxi took an unusual route over the hill through Beverly Hills and Bel Air. We passed by amazing lit-up homes and were treated to an incredible view of the lights of downtown LA.

The only thing that could beat that was, of course, a Morrissey concert. I sat about 30 feet from the stage on the left.

There are no coincidences. About six weeks before, I happened upon a Morrissey interview on the Internet while staying in a hotel in LA. I decided to search for Morrissey concert dates. Sure enough, Morrissey was playing in Los Angeles in November, on a Thursday night. It just so happens that I travel to Los Angeles frequently on Thursdays. There are some things that only make sense after they happen. They are impossible to predict.

Before the band took the stage, in classic Morrissey fashion, a slightly high-pitched male voice spoke over dark music. The voice said things like "cancer" "oil" "Apartheid" "Nancy" "Reagan."

Apartheid might be officially over, but what has replaced it is far more sinister: white elitist capitalism. The dark people of the world must continue the struggle.

I thought to myself, I have to allow myself to let go now. Let go of all knowledge about how many things have gone wrong with this parallel universe. Just dance and sing. Return to it tomorrow.

The first song was How Soon is Now? Morrissey's voice is still incredible. His face and body are well, puffier. Just like mine. I liked the way he used the microphone wire like a whip. He can still do full justice to that song. The crowd ate it up and cheered “thank you, more.”

When Morrissey said "I feel the warmth of the home crowd," I knew we were witnessing history. I'm used to Morrissey-Manchester. Morrissey-LA is completely foreign but somehow welcome. HE IS OURS.

Morrissey is a great performer. His facial expressions are spot-on and his hands and arms are mesmerizing. His body moves to the beat of the music and he occasionally strikes a dramatic pose that only works for Morrissey. He is comfortable in front an audience and the audience is comfortable watching him. Morrissey has aged into crooner status. He’s like a father or an older brother.

Morrissey may be getting up there in years, but his band consists of young male players who ROCK, particularly drummer Dino who kept the band energized the entire night. Their facial expressions were along the lines of "I can't believe I'm up here playing for Morrissey!"

Morrissey’s attire was that of a Catholic priest complete with a necklace bearing a cross. He said, "I'm not wearing this for effect."

The audience was mostly in their late 20s and early 30s. If there were any teenagers there, I didn’t see any.

The crowd was about 50% Latino. Much has been said about Morrissey’s Latino appeal. It’s nothing new to me – one of my best friends in high school who happens to be Latino adored Morrissey more than I did. Morrissey certainly isn’t Ricky Martin so on a superficial level the confusion is understandable. Latinos like Morrissey for the same reasons I do: the music rocks, his voice and style are unique, and he points out the hypocrisy of our white male-dominated society. Morrissey asks a simple question: how do you prove you’re human? And clearly, morons fail the test. Morrissey’s smart observations ring true with the Latinos’ outsider status in America.

HSIN was followed by November Spawned a Monster. Morrissey lay on floor during the oboe part. I completely let myself go, singing so many of the phrases that repeated into my eardrums time and time again while riding Caltrain late in the night from San Francisco to San Mateo. I threw my body in a way I have never done before.

Morrissey played a lot of songs from his album and a good collection of oldies. Sadly, he didn't sing "Meat is Murder."

He said, "The fact is that I like you" before singing his new song "I like you" that proclaims:


During "Rubber Ring," after the first verse of "don't forget the songs that made you smile and the songs that saved your life" I shouted "I never did!" I had to tell him, I couldn't leave it inside any longer.

Before singing "Irish Blood, English Heart," he said (I can only paraphrase, sorry, no pen and paper): "The good people lost the election. The man of illiteracy and war won. I don't say this out of meanness, I say it out of fear." IBEH talks about the sticky guilt that comes from imperialism. The same guilt that will drag the US down into the tarpit. The US has never gotten over Indian genocide or slavery, and now there's more to feel bad about. It will catch up to us, like Vietnam did. It always does.

After singing "The World is Full of Crashing Bores", Morrissey said, "The world is full of crashing bores and I can prove it because the majority is always wrong." And I shouted back, "That's why Democracy isn't such a good thing."

He said to his adoring and screaming crowd, "The funny thing is, if you saw me in Ralph's you would walk right past me. You would."

Morrissey played four encores ending with "There is a Light that Never Goes Out." Flowers were thrown on stage. Morrissey threw three of his silk shirts into the audience. Several men and women in the orchestra pit did their best to get on stage, battling the body guards for a kiss of Morrissey's cheek.

There are no coincidences. As I waited for the cab ride home, I spoke with a man in a wheelchair. He asked me which song I liked best. I said NSM. He said he really liked that one and had special meaning to him. NSM is about a disfigured child who despite the indifferent world learns to live her own life. He mentioned the difficulty of raising his chair so he could see over the standing crowd.

There are no coincidences. The cabbie was Afro American. He asked me who was performing. I said "you've probably never heard of him." R&B was playing softly on the radio: Come here and enjoy yourself. I said, "Morrissey is too depressing for you. You're an R&B man."

I managed to let go for a couple of hours, not nearly long enough. The world was waiting for me until I returned. I said, "He's British. We're about to become as depressed and full of guilt as the British by sending our soldiers to kill people." We talked about how the Bushes and their friends systematically killed JFK, Bobby Kennedy, and Martin Luther King. "If Bobby wasn't shot," I said, "this world would be a different place." He then put in a tape of another Bobby, Bob Marley, and said "here's another man who only comes once in a lifetime." He sang a few verses from Redemption Song:


There are no coincidences.

I told the cabbie, "I do not want to pass these values on to my daughter. She only sees me go to work." He suggested I not do anything drastic. She is seeing first-hand what Daddys do: take care of their beloved children.

The behavior of the Bushes and those like them is a direct result of their fathers never hugging them and saying, sincerely, "I really, really love you." So they sought love from drugs, money, violence, and power. And finally faux Christianity, a form of Christianity that encourages the hate that fuels the international weapons trade as wells as Zionism. That is what "We've got to fulfill the book" is referring to: Armageddon.

Just one half hour prior, Morrissey sang:


in "Every Day is Like Sunday" to a delighted audience who sang along. Morrissey and the audience collectively begged the barely bearable world to end before it gets any worse. Effective, no. Cathartic, yes.

There are no coincidences.

I want Kate to see her Daddy when he full of joy, as I was tonight, not just as an overburdened white man condemned to a midlife crisis. So that she can learn that expressing joy is normal and .. desirable.

The struggle continues.

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