Anaesthesine
Angel of Distemper
It was. Dublin, 29th of July 2011. Here's how it went down, as posted on 'The Cissy Site' at the time ~
It was a truly beautiful moment. You had a hunch something special was about to happen because Jesse strapped on that pretty red guitar that he uses for 'There Is A Light..', then Morrissey and his band all crowded together in a loose huddle around Matt's drumkit, there was a bit of discussion, Matt looked at Moz with a 'Right?' look, Moz took a swig of water, then gave a firm nod; and off we bloody well went. Clearly there must have been some doubt as to whether they would play it.
Despite the clueless dolts about me in the balcony, I yelped with glee when I heard the opening line, as did many others down below who realised the momentousness of the...moment. Well actually they roared. I yelped. Each to their own, etc.
I was literally biting my knuckles whlist grinning, if that's physically possible, in the manner of a sweet-stuffed chubby child, for the entirety of the rendition.
The band nursed it gently, like an 'unpriapic fawn' being born into this world, and Morrissey was clearly nervous, which was incredibly charming. Mere minutes before he'd delivered 'Scandinavia' in a version that was so perfect in it's dark and twisted potency, so breathtaking in it's phrasing, control and precision, so pure in intent and intent on purity, that to see him switch to another skewed ode to the joys and misery of love, memory {and geography}, and address it so differently was...sublime. There was a devoted fragility to the performance that could have been debut nerves, or it could have been Moz channeling the emotion that first inspired the lyric. Who can say? Not even the man himself I'd wager. I prefer to pick the latter option.
He made some self-deprecating comments after it, over the wild yawps and screams, along the lines of 'You can't mean that' etc, etc. but that's just Morrissey. What does he know?
I hope he does it again. And I hope he doesn't. Weird.
To see him tightly closehis eyes, open his loving mouth and sing "and here is the very last plea from my heart, my heart / forevermore " is one of those heghtened memories I'll have forever...more
...we knew, we just knew...
Holy smokes! I've got chills...
Hey, it's not my list - it's the fans'!
As for Nobody Loves Us, it's consistently voted as a favourite. In the big poll that I took the list from, it's in the top 20 (of nearly 200 Morrissey songs).
The problem is that it was only a b-side. Had it been a single, it would be getting played on radio stations and at indie discos across the land to this day!
Precisely. It should be ubiquitous, like "Mack the Knife" or "Le Chant D'Amour." A classic.