I got to the venue just before 9pm, after landing at the airport that afternoon, and enduring the stupid questions from US immigration. Having been up for a while, and having had a few beers in the couple of hours beforehand, I quite fancied some food inside the venue. I went to a stall, and saw a lovely photo of a cheeseburger on the menu. On ordering, I was told "We have a vegetarian menu tonight sir, er, due to the performer". Ah yes, this was a Morrissey gig!
This was a Morrissey gig, the kind of which you would not see in the UK. On this side of the Atlantic, Morrissey has a small but extremely devoted band of fans. There were plenty of Smiths t-shirts on display, and many of the shirts being sold at the merchandise stand featured photos that were at least 10 years old - still with a full 80s quiff in evidence. That said, there did also still seem to be a good number of people there that had no idea what was going on, or who they were watching. But overwhelmingly, the audience was devoted and loving - even more so than those at the UK gigs I have been to in the past.
To underline the point that this was special, Morrissey came on stage and played The Queen Is Dead immediately, something that I have never heard live before, and that I doubt is very common at UK gigs. During the set, this was joined by Every Day Is Like Sunday, Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want, Girlfriend In A Coma, and a much talked about new song called Throwing My Arms Around Paris, none of which I think you would ever hear in front of the UK media that Morrissey finds so difficult to deal with. Perhaps it is the relative obscurity in the US that is the attraction, but he seemed far more comfortable here than I have ever seen before - getting people up on stage, letting fans talk on the mic, and ripping his shirt off and throwing it into the crowd on a couple of occasions.
Throughout the show, the band seemed much more like an exciting rock band that I expected - their sound was edgy and at times heavy. The highlight for me came during Irish Blood, English Heart, where the lyrics talk about English people, and how Morrissey is embarrassed to be one sometimes. It felt strange standing there as an English person, in the middle of a big crowd of Americans, listening to that. During the song, instead of lyrics which look forward to the day when "the English are sick to death of Labour", he looked forward to the day when "the Americans are sick to death of Republicans" - which drew an absolutely amazing cheer all round. This is truly a country in which Morrissey seems to feel at home - bantering with the crowd, shaking hands with almost everybody in the front row, identifying the things that they like and dislike, and even engaging in sarcasm with the audience, which a majority seemed even to understand. He may have been born and raised in England, but from what I saw tonight, Morrissey belongs to America and Americans now.
All in all, this was a brilliant set, with the band sounding as exciting as any band I've seen lately, the song selection simply inspired (and it really just made me think about the obscene lengths I would go to, to see any future Smiths reunion), and Morrissey on fantastic form. A real revelation, and I'm so glad I went along.
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