A Night Out with… Morrissey
The pre-match talk concerned two main topics: would he play many old Smiths songs and whether we would have to endure a support act. Thankfully, both questions were more than adequately resolved.
Morrissey live in The Hall in Dübendorf
At around 8:10 the support question was answered when it became clear that this role would be played by a thirty minute plus collage of video clips designed no doubt to catalogue a whole host of people who Morrissey himself either idolizes or at the very least hugely admires. Bands, comedians, film stars spanning the 50s through to the 70s all had their moments so that those concert-goers of a certain age had great fun pointing out who each person was and wondering who would appear next. Kenneth Williams of Carry On film fame made a short and not unexpected appearance swiftly followed by Benny Hill in drag, 70’s music fans marveled at clips of The Ramones, Sham 69 and The New York Dolls. We began to wonder at this stage if Morrissey had made a huge gaff by highlighting the aforementioned bands in case the audience would rather have been taken back there than enjoy what was to follow. It took me a while to recognize Gene Pitney, he looked a little rough around the edges so unlike my memory of him from grainy black and white appearances on early Sixties Top of the Pops. “Billy You’re My Friend” was Morrissey’s chosen Pitney song, not his finest. French new wave film stars came and went before the inevitable Bowie in Ziggy mode at Hammersmith moment, and then the video fun ceased as Diana Dors pouted seductively from the screen and our next question would be answered. On came Morrissey…
And he was greeted in what for a Zurich audience can only be described as rapturously. Thankfully many stood, which meant that those of us who had some of the worst seats in the house in row one of the Tribune, where our view would have been of heads and shoulders, instead could just about see what was happening on stage sixty yards away. A swift glance to the left informed us that by leaving designated seats and heading to the left aisle a better view could be had. And there we stayed for the duration, sneering at any security guard who dared venture into our new environs. Morrissey, unaware of the viewing problems encountered by the more vertically-challenged or visually-challenged members of the audience proceeded to entertain his followers with as fine a show of Morrissey songs from his back catalogue combined with a sprinkling of Smiths classics as anyone could have expected. His set contained three songs from his new album Make-Up Is a Lie including the title track, the provocative “Notre Dame” and the excellent “Monsters of Pig Alley”. Fans of earlier albums were not let down by a wonderful rendition of “Suedehead”, the evening highlight “Irish Blood, English Heart” and personal favourite “Every Day Is Like Sunday”.
What can only be described as an awful view from our designated seats in the first row of the Tribune - soon to be abandoned to stand in the left aisle area
The Smiths fans would not be leaving empty-handed. “A Rush and A Push and the Land is Ours” from Strangeways Here We Come whetted the taste buds. “Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me” and the magnificent “How Soon Is Now” were joyfully received, and of course for an encore then what better than crowd singalong favourite “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out”, just as his old songwriting sidekick had done four months earlier just across town. But perhaps the evening’s most poignant moment was The Queen Is Dead’s most haunting track “I Know It’s Over”. With photographs of his much-loved vegetarian mother behind him, the crooner delivered a perfect take, but it was the lyrics that hit hardest most. ‘It’s so easy to hate, it takes strength to be gentle and kind.’ With all that was going on in the world outside the confines of The Hall this was perhaps the message he wanted us to carry away with us into the spring-like Zurich night.
“There Is A Light That Never Goes Out” - a true classic!