St. Louis wrap up

The venue was odd because the floor that security was standing on was three feet below our floor, while the stage was only a foot above us, which meant you were practically eye to eye with the performers, but there was a 3 or 4 foot gap between the stage and the barrier. All in all, this was a small apathetic crowd, no more than 900 people. Not only was there almost no line, very few people were dancing or even trying to squish up close. However, Morrissey was in fine form, bantering with the crowd ("As many of you might know, I was once the lead singer of a band called ‘Siouxsie and the Banshees’", "This next one is by Salt’n’Pepa") and frolicking. He kept teasing the crowd, and he was also more self-sexual than any other show I’ve seen him at. He kept rubbing the mike all along his nipples, and wiping the sweat from his head all over his body. At one point, he dropped it down the front of his shirt and let it hang quite suggestively out the bottom in front of his fly.

Before the show, a radio station van pulled up in front of the theater, and so we wandered over to see if they were giving out any good stuff. Indeed, there’s a guy standing next to the perky bleached blonde dj, and he’s holding 10 or so Maladjusted poster flats. The dj asked "who’s the biggest fan here? Who got here first?" and then handed out posters. But these were no ordinary posters, no, no. They were all signed. I just kind of stared at mine for a few seconds before it hit me that this was an autographed poster. yippee!

The Smoking Popes set was quite good, and they seemed to be playing new stuff, or at least not stuff off their albums. At one point while they were playing I looked down the bar, and there were 3 or four people bopping to the music, about half of the people were listening, and the other half were draped all over the place staring disdainfully at the band. I however, was bopping up and down and singing (well, lip synching) all of the songs. This meant that Josh, the singer, spent a lot of the time singing to me, which was neat-o. Then, at the end of "Pure Imagination" I was grinning at him, and he grinned back and abruptly turned and started to rummage through his bag, pulling something out. Curious. During their last song, "I Need You Around," he went back and picked up the thing he had taken out of the bag. When he came back to the front, I saw it was a disposable camera. He then took my picture, which was odd but neat — I’ve never befriended a band before.

After a nerve-racking wait between sets, they started the buildup to Morrissey’s entrance — a very slow, very suspenseful, very painful buildup. Finally, though, he came out with a cigarette (unlit) in his mouth, which he promptly spit out. He was in a black shirt and browny-gray trousers, and he looked very good. He also was wearing a Gucci belt which he took off during "Ambitious Outsiders", after much fiddling with it. When he took it off he whipped it around his head a few times, then threw it to the wing of the stage.

It should be mentioned, that while whenever he came to the wings of the stage, everyone over there would stick out their hands, only two of us, (it seemed) were doing so when he was in the center. We would sort of post ourselves up the barrier, hoping to get close enough to touch him. During "Alma Matters", he comes back to the center, and we once again post our selves up toward him — we were both too short to touch him (odd, since we’re not short) but he squatted on the edge of the stage and reached for us. The girl next to me extended flowers towards him, and he took them by the stems. He then tried to swing them to me. The person on the other side tried to get them, but he pulled them away and extended them back to me. However, it took several tries to get them to me and after the first two tries he was giggling as we kept trying to make contact. Eventually, though, I got them.

During the course of the show, 3 or 4 people had thrown or handed notes to Morrissey, all of which he put back by the drums. During "Now My Heart is Full" when he was in front of me, I wiggled my note so he would know I have one. He sticks out his arm and motions for me to throw it. It lands at his feet, and he picks it up and puts it in his pocket — it was the only one all night that ended up there.

Then when they come back for the encore (as they were walking off, Alain was blowing kisses and mouthing "We’ll be back") Morrissey had changed into a white shirt. He didn’t sing about half of the song, because he was having trouble with the sound (you could tell because he went around and checked everyone’s string, which Alain kept laughing at). However, the crowd quite happily filled in for him. Near the end of the song, he rips off his shirt, buttons flying everywhere. (To all of you people who say he’s old and fat now: Nu-uh. He looked quite good.) Of course, he whips it into the crowd and it land about 3 people over from me. I stick my arm in and grab an inch and a half long piece of seam. However, at the end of the song, after they walk off, the t-shirt scuffle is still going on behind me. I stick my arm back in, and grab hold of a piece. This guy manages to tear our bit off, and he shouts "we’ll tear it in half!" He actually tore it into a little piece and a big piece, then he gave me the big piece. Some guy behind me wanted some, so I let him rip off a piece. After all of this, I look at it, and realize I’ve got button holes, 2 of them, so my shirt shard is actually identifiable as a shirt.

Alison Olcott

* As a side note, the security guard we befriended told us one funny story Morrissey’s crew told him. Apparently, they’re all mightily pissed about Morrissey’s ban on eating meat, so every time they’re paid, they all sneak off together in a van to a steak house and chow down.