It amazes me that people come to this site this far into the tour still expressing surprise that he's playing Satellite Of Love, which he's played virtually every gig since this tour began back in June (or whenever?) as Morrissey-Solo has constantly reported - one of the great positives of this site is its constant up to date posting of set lists after each gig.
There are people who do not follow the tour on the internet. I spoke to a lovely Belgian man and his wife or whatever it was and he had been a huge Smiths fan until Morrissey's release of Viva Hate and he was very much looking forward to Morrissey coming on stage, got his quiff all ready and such, his wife coloured her hair especially for Morrissey
, but I was the one who updated him on what Morrissey currently plays. He named numerous of his songs, which I reckon are his favourites, and I told him that yes, no, sometimes they get played. He could sing along to the songs so well that I told him during I Know It's Over that he could well become a Morrissey impersonator. Somehow they even looked like brothers. He was completely out of touch with current Morrissey and this was Morrissey's chance to get him on board again.
Missed the Hearbreaks because the hot weather wore me out in the car so I made a longer stop at a garage and a shopping centre in Belgium, got to the venue with the second band of the festival playing which sounded good, nice to listen to. Third band was so repetitive however that I eventually thought "The things one endures for Morrissey" and it was a good reminder that I should clearly stay away from punk. When Morrissey came on stage and they started to play, him singing, I thought of the many people who complain about their playing and that every single one of the complainers needs a smack at the head. They are clearly amongst the most enjoyable ones to listen to.
At one point David came to my mind and I thought that it would have been a good thing if he had had the chance to go there and listen again in reality like I just did.
Most of their playing rushed past pretty quickly, but less so because I could not sing along. I sang long during the first song, but an instant turn of the head of the guy in front of me silenced me down. With the heat, then the heavy rain and the 6 feet under perspective I joked to the Belgians that this is now literally us travellers to the grave...
"Are you ready to take a risk?"
I WANT THE ONE I CAN'T HAVE
In my memory he came on stage, looked around before he started singing, looked to the front row and said something like "Oh Julia" with a very deep sigh. If you ask me, they are just doing their job the best they can. I was impressed by how caring Charlie is to make extra sure that everything is perfect for Morrissey to be on stage. The grass contrast between how it is all portrayed and changed in your head here always gets me. This is the main reason why I made the distinction in my head between Morrissey image and Morrissey person. Morrissey image is for me what you get through the media, his fans, but also his lyrics and the art involved. Morrissey person is the living breathing person.
He changed "please come around" to "please somebody come around". Or was it anybody? Something like this.
"Do you have any objections? I shall give you time. You'll think of some."
Some people complain about everything. Not what he said, but my comment to his comment.
YOU HAVE KILLED ME (lyric change: "what the hell is YOUR life for" & "I forgive you, because the night is made for lovers", "thank you").
He also said something like “Why do I sing this song now?”
band introductions: "Il y a Boz Boorer. Il y a Solomon Walker. Playing the drums - the drums! - is Matthew Walker. Playing the piano is Gustavo Manzur. And standing here is Jesse Tobi--i-i-i Jesse Tobias. Yes, you're very kind. [pretends to sneeze] Hatchoo."
Yes, sounded like a sneeze. I did not notice that he spoke French. Just like I did not notice that the New York Dolls were introduced in German. The Belgian suddenly said "Hey, that's for you?" and it took me a moment to get what he meant.
I'M THROWING MY ARMS AROUND PARIS ["I STUMBLE all over the place"]
"The wind is wuthering."
A very good remark, because it was hot under my rain jacket and it made me realize that he was standing up there in his beautiful pink shirt in the wind. Even though 18-19°C warm, this can feel colder if you are sweaty or wet from drizzling rain. Could be that he played shorter for that reason despite the shirt change, because the festival organizers had told me that he'd be on stage for 1 hour 15 minutes. He still has three more concerts. However, why can't musicians just put on a rainjacket if they have to sing in such weather? Am I thinking too practically and too little image wise? If anybody were to judge me by my imagine yesterday, I'd be well a complete failure.
Ok, let's see it this way: he canceled a concert in Sweden because of the weather, and as I got to the venue I half expected to be told that Morrissey was not going to play. He did however, for over an hour.
MEAT IS MURDER [Because this was a festival gig, we got to see the video's properly on the festival screens by the side of the stage - very powerful.]
I did not look. Only once briefly and it looked disgusting and the image is still in my head. I had the image of the dead bird in my head instead however as I did not look that I had buried two days before. It suddenly lay there dead in my garden.
But if you feed about 50 wild birds I suppose it has to happen eventually that one of them dies there. The rest of the time I looked at one of the security guys in front of me and I am impressed how he kept looking at the images on the video screen. He surely took the information in.
Exit: 'Death' (Klaus Nomi)
I remember
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Aq_N0bllCM
which was played right after Klaus Nomi then?
1 shirt change (none thrown) - from pink to sparkly red after Meat Is Murder.
The sparkling dark red is with black.
