Houston, Texas, this evening.
Artwork drawn by me between yesterday and today (30th-31st October).
Detail of a picture I took the day after, with the pale daylight of the morning, which is still better than the electric light.
Detail and pictures taken after I finished my artwork, just before going to the soirée "Piano qui chante".
The drawing in its whole.
Step by step, but à rebours...
Have a great tour with your band, Morrissey!
I hope to God to see you again in Europe (France, UK, etc.) next year.
Viva Uncle!
Vera da Pozzo, Paris, 31st October 2024
(C) Vera da Pozzo
(C) Italy is Mine
(C) Italy is Mine and It owes Me a Living
Update: I am very happy to see on YouTube some videos of the first gig of Morrissey's new tour, thanks to Baby J (he or she is very lucky to have the time and the money to attend so many concerts of the Mancunian Swan - "il Cigno di Manchester", as I would say in my mother tongue) who was also in Paris, but not in Dublin last year.
Is the live debut of I ex-love You implicitly announcing the long-awaited release of the no-more-last album Bonfire of Teenagers? It would be good news if it was released soon, hopefully shortly before or even at the same time of the more recent album Without Music the World dies.
Every time I see or I go to some Intermarché supermarket in Paris, I can't help smiling because I remember that, during the second Parisian gig, Morrissey told us that maybe, one day, we could find his new albums in a bag of chips bought at the In-ter-marché. He spelt the name of the supermarket with a good pronunciation, but split in three syllables, which sounded purposedly pompous and so hilarious.
As I want to keep myself safe and very far from the social media (Fakebook/Methan, Twatter/Eggs, InstaGroom, TokTok), the instant messaging apps like Slapchat, Whatsoup et cætera, and the audio streaming services like Spitify, I rely on the official Morrissey's website, I watch videos on YouTube (I still don't have an account nor a personal channel), I read some bits of the Morrissey Mercury newsletter (I like the genuine enthusiasm of these guys and their journalistic efforts, but I am not into podcasts in general and I am not interested at all in wine, horoscopes and New Age stuff) and I look for more informations on Morrissey-solo, a very strange forum where a bunch of obsessed, nasty and sometimes disturbed people play the sempiternal comédie humaine in a way that it can turn into drama and childish bullying.
Many years ago, in the mid-Noughties, I discovered both true-to-you and Morrissey-solo and I had a very bad experience with this forum, so I decided that I would have never come back to Morrissey-solo because it was a waste of time, energies and neurons, even if David T, the creator, webmaster, administrator and moderator of the forum, had been kind to me.
About four years ago, I came back to Morrissey-solo without an account, just for reading some threads: for someone who, like me, avoid social media, this forum is very useful for the amount of interesting contents, news and pictures that many moderators or just members share (and I am grateful to them) but, unfortunately, things have not changed since I left it more than a decade ago: there is still plenty of hatred, gossip and badmouthing towards Morrissey and other people around him (band and family members) and, not surprisingly, also a lot of nasty comments from members (or unregistered anonymous people) addressed to other members in the forum, which makes this place quite boring and even depressing: bitter people criticizing concerts they did not attend, haters judging and insulting people they don't know, and so on; and I find the excited and enraged cultists cringeworthy too.
It is not about the critics, when they are objective and well-argued, which is rarely the case; but, in spite of some reasonable, respectful, clever and nice people, there are too much obsession, rage, bitterness, vulgarity, trolling, and gratuitous nastiness in the forum and this is one more reason for me to stay away from all of this, because my time is too precious to waste it.
By the way, for my little past experience on three very different online forums, you know when you start discussing a topic in a civil way, but you never know when and how the discussion end; meanwhile, the time has run and you realize you should have spent it better otherwise and elsewhere than online; and this is true also when you just read a thread with all the interactions, whether they are good or bad.
Thus, I just take the good side of Morrissey-solo and enjoy the informative contents, as the news (Morrissey helping Salford Lads Club, which makes me glad but does not surprise me at all, for I was sure he would have made a donation in order to save this historical and important place both for the Mancunian youth and the Smiths' legacy) and the setlists and pictures of the concerts I unfortunately could not attend.
Below, some photographs taken at the 713 Music Hall, Houston, TX: many thanks to the people taking the pictures (of course, I will mention them below) and to Famous when Dead, moderator, who posted them on Morrissey-solo.
Backdrop image by El Dedo, picture taken by Aislie.
Carmen Vandenberg (I saw her in Dublin in 2023) and Matt Walker (I saw him in Paris in 2009) with Halloween make-up, pictures by Nacho De la Garza for "The Heart Sounds" mag.
Morrissey and his band on stage, photo by Ralph Kramer. I saw bassist Juan Galeano Toro in Paris last year and guitarist Jessie Tobias in all the concert I have attended. Unfortunately, Camila Grey (whom I saw in Dublin last year) is not in the picture: if I find a photo with her, I will add it here.
From the lads to the ladies, it is always a pleusure to see and listen to Morrissey where he belongs: up on the stage.
I hope the recent physical problems he hinted to during the concert are completely over and I wish him to be in great form.
Below, five black-and-white pictures taken by photographer Joshua C. Mares: Morrissey on stage, Jessie Tobias and some annoying people, holding their smartphones too high during the entire concert because they don't care about people standing behind them. In an updated version of Dante's Inferno, they surely would be condemned to stand in a pit behind the giant and not handsome devil from Malacoda's gang of tormentors.
Of course, 2.0. Dante would condemn to the same pain all the fans who scream or talk very loud while Morrissey is speaking and/or who sing out loud (and generally out of tune) when Morrissey is singing.
Why do they need to ruin our pleasure to hear Morrissey's beautiful voice and to listen to him ? Perhaps because most of them had the chance to see him so often and some of them are just fatuous people wanting to be noticed?
Of course, it is not the New Year Concert in Wien and it is really enjoyable for Morrissey to have and for us to be an enthusiastic crowd, but the way these fans behave show more egocentrism than enthusiasm.
[What follows has been added after the second gig in Dallas, which has abruptedly interrupt by a bunch of minus habens]
As for the fans jumping on stage and acting like insane that have just fled from an asylum (if only they really were mentally ill, I would pity them, but they are just silly women and stupid men wanting to be noticed, behaving like thugs towards people from the crowd and the tour crew and treating Morrissey as if he was their own teddy bear to torment and tear up, and not a sensible and sensitive human being and an artist) the pain should be even worse. But I find very disturbing that some members on Morrissey-solo call for a public shaming of the idiots who ruined the concert and think that they even should be jailed and even crucified, when the only, just and sane thing to do would be to ban them from Morrissey's concerts.
I know that Morrissey likes hugs, even if he is still ill (when you are an introvert, and I know what it means, you surely can be sociable to some extent, but you always have to be left alone when you need it) and it is appalling to see some fans who claim to love him whilst they do not really care about him, but about themselves. When I was a child, living far from England and never having seen footages of Morrissey's concerts with The Smiths and solo, I learnt from the radio that there were people jumping on stage to hug and kiss him and I found it scary and dangerous. Even some people standing in the front row and having the chance to shake hands with Morrissey can be dangerous, when they grasp his hand and pull him without thinking that they could hurt him by making him fall into the pit: I saw it with my own eyes and I found it very dangerous and unbearebly selfish.
I hope, one day, I will have the chance to shake hands politely with Morrissey, and I know that, if this happened, I would never hurt him nor people in the crowd.
But let us come back to Morrissey's first gig and enjoy these beautiful photos taken by Joshua C. Mares.
Below: photo by billybudd71.
As I have wrote at the beginning of my article, before the tour started, I wish Morrissey and his band (Camila Grey, Carmen Vandenberg, Jessie Tobias, Juan Galeano Toro and Matt Walker) a very happy and successful tour, and I hope to God there will be an European tour in 2025 and that I will able to attend many concerts.
Morrissey, go and shine: you'll be fine.
Viva Uncle!
Vera da Pozzo, Paris, 1st November 2024
New update on 2nd November 2024: pictures by Ryan Lowry of the Houston concert have been posted on Morrissey Central.
(C) Vera da Pozzo
(C) Italy is Mine
(C) Italy is Mine and It owes Me a Living
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