Morrissey at The Moore – Show Review
Morrissey at The Moore
Show review by Carolyn Frye
3.6.13
Last Wednesday Morrissey played to a packed house at The Moore Theatre and it was awesome! It was filled with young and old, alike. Quite a diverse & eclectic crowd, I’d say. There seemed to be someone from every point of his long career.
It all started, on time I might add, with his opening act Kristeen Young. She was good and fit in well with the diverse audience. She had on a really great hounds tooth, vintage looking dress with a modern-ish flare. The collar flew out to the side like it was in permanent wind, it was very snazzy! She wore her hair in a great retro style, too. It was all a good fit for her. Her music was fun and you could tell that she was having fun doing it! To me, watching the artist have fun & enjoying what they’re doing, makes it that much more fun to watch! I liked her a lot.
When she finished, it was time for the set change, they played lots of videos on a large screen to entertain us. They were black & white, and seemed to be from the 60’s. I’m also guessing that they were British groups, as Morrissey is from London and neither myself nor the nice girl I was sitting next to knew who they were. The girl did recognize one song, barely, and Googled it, it was being sang by a British chick. So that’s how I came to that conclusion.
Finally it was time to start and it was on! They came out, took a bow & waved to the audience & took their places. As Morrissey started, the crowd roared and were on their feet as the band immediately started with “Shoplifters Of The World Unite”, a classic Smiths song. It was awesome & Morrissey sounds just as great now as he did back then! He then went into a string of Morrissey hits, including “Everyday Is Like Sunday” and “Maladjusted”. He stopped to talk to the audience a few times & set up clever lead-ins to songs. He also posed the question “What is more important, the thought or the expression?” He took some answers from assorted people in the front rows. He told them they were all wrong but never told us what his answer was. Just something to think about, I suppose.
They played some more and then, all of a sudden what came next shocked me! Now, anyone that knows Morrissey knows that he is, and always has been into animal rights, however I was still caught off guard. They started The Smiths “Meat Is Murder” and used PETAs “Meet Your Meat” video for the imagery. I listened but didn’t watch. Instead I looked around at the looks on people’s faces, which ranged from “as mortified as I was” to “it didn’t seem to bother them”. It all came to a dramatic end with the drummer who stood up and did his thing on a giant gong that was behind him and an extra large bass drum, the kind that’s used in an orchestra, which lit up like a bolt of lightning with every pound! Morrissey used this time to sneak off stage for a shirt change. When he came back it was pretty quiet, and he said “What, you’ve got nothing to say now? I’ve been telling you this for years.”
The show was on again and he was singing away, when all of a sudden he ripped his shirt off, just like Superman, and flung it into the audience where it caused quite the frenzy from both the men and the women! While that was settling down, he put on his third and final shirt and started again. It was almost the end of the show and people were still having fun when they ripped into The Smiths “How Soon Is Now?”. The crowd went wild, it was awesome live and they ended it with some awesome drums and gong! Who brings a GONG? What a great way to end an excellent set!
They came back with “The Boy With The Thorn In His Side” as the encore and it was over. As I was milling my way out, along with everyone else, I heard people still talking about the “thought vs expression” question.
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