Thursday, Mar. 12, 2009
morrissey at the house of blues
Morrissey on stage March 6 at the House of Blues in North Myrtle Beach. -Photo by Jonathan Sharpe.
Back at the beach some two years since his last visit with a gig March 6 at the House of Blues in North Myrtle Beach, Morrissey's first words were "nothing could be finer." Alluding to both the old Kahn and Donaldson tune as well his recently cancelled shows in Boca Raton, Orlando, St. Petersburg and Jacksonville, what followed, unfortunately, was scarcely the case for those in attendance.
Clad in matching sailor blue shirts and lighter denim bottoms, Moz and the boys launched headfirst into a tepid version of track one "Something Is Squeezing My Skull" from his latest disc "Years of Refusal." Almost immediately, it was quite clear that Morrissey was not 100 percent. His vocal arpeggios in the chorus, so slick and telegraphed on the record, were halfhearted and sloppy here. And on the next number, "Mama Lay Softly on The Riverbed," it was as if he had checked out completely.
Intonation and overall verve improved on the classic Smiths song "This Charming Man," but were ultimately negated by a lackluster rendition of "Years of Refusal's" "Black Cloud." This pattern of well executed older song and lethargic new one continued throughout the night with Morrissey turning in some truly magnificent renderings - "First of The Gang," "Ask," "The World Is Full of Crashing Bores" - amongst others he'd no doubt want stricken from the record - "All You Need Is Me," in particular. Thanks to the wonders of cell phones and YouTube, though, his performance of "I'm Throwing My Arms Around Paris" isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
The most disappointing spectacle of all perhaps was the trite and tired one-two punch of "Life Is A Pigsty"/"How Soon Is Now." As anyone who saw him the last go round on the "Ringleader of the Tormentors" tour can attest, this programming choice has long since run its course. What was incredibly moving and awe-inspiring then is borderline bathos now.
It might have worked, actually, if Morrissey was well enough to come back for an encore proper. By the end of the evening, it was more than apparent he was not. A pernicious few still clamored for more, but when the house lights turned back on a little more than an hour after they had dimmed, they certainly got the message.
And like a child who knows he's done wrong, Morrissey cancelled the next night's gig in Atlanta.