Morrissey: An appreciation

The artist known as Morrissey is performing for the first and perhaps last time in the country this Sunday. This is why you shouldn’t miss it.

It’s the voice that first hits you, that rich baritone that expresses so much of loneliness and longing, that feeling that someone, somewhere else has indeed understood. It is a dynamic instrument that is so singular in that it can also erupt in ecstatic yelps and defiant howls without ever seeming incongruous that these sounds, these emotions could be expressed so well by one individual, sometimes within the space of a single song. The fact that he uses words so well — he is, after all, acclaimed by many as perhaps the greatest lyricist in pop history ever — oftentimes obscures that his greatness lies in how he sings as much as what he sings about. In that regard, he’s up there with the likes of Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley. Yet the fact that he writes his own verses cannot and should not be overlooked. It sets him apart.

And Morrissey’s words do matter. They resonate even if you don’t pick up on all the reference points that a lot of books have taken great pains to point out and reveal to us. (Of course, becoming aware of them admittedly adds to the appreciation of the man’s genius.) In the 2004 documentary, The Importance of Being Morrissey, author JK Rowling confessed that, “The Smiths were the only group whose falling apart really affected me personally. I was very sad.’ And one can understand why. His work inspires a very emotional response that has never been reliant on just being clever, witty, or tasteful. (Author Will Self has credited the singer for being able to encapsulate “200 years of philosophical speculation in a single line: ‘Does the body rule the mind or does the mind rule the body, I dunno.”) Yes, it is all of those things and they do satisfy on an intellectual level but that isn’t why he’s remained dear to us since the 1980s. It might just be because he’s made us feel a little less alone but without the cloying reassurance that you are anything but.

“The best moments in reading are when you come across something — a thought, a feeling, a way of looking at things — which you had thought special and particular to you. And now, here it is, set down by someone else, a person you have never met, someone even who is long dead. And it is as if a hand has come out, and taken yours.” Those words are taken from playwright Alan Bennett’s The History Boys and it captures brilliantly Morrissey’s appeal and why the relationship he has to many of his fans cannot be described purely in popular music terms but rather to authors such as Oscar Wilde, Emily Bronte and even Bennett himself (who incidentally is a friend and former neighbor of the singer’s.)

A man of his age and accomplishments is expected to start to settle down and not still continue settling scores. But Morrissey is an artist of great passions (whether it be about animal rights, being your own person in the face of great adversity, or just the fact that, as he has put it, “no one knows what human life is”) and those drive him to continue and try to make a difference. Of course, he already has.

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For tickets (and they’re running out fast) please contact Charlemagne at 0917-8334223. Thanks also to Little Asia. Thank God for comfort food.