The night before the Merillville show, I was staying at the Courtyard Marriott, and when i was checking in, Kristeen Young was standing in front of me. I overheard her saying she was part of a "big group" that would be coming in later in the night. So I decided to stay up and wait for this big group, thinking maybe there was a small chance I could catch a glimpse of Morrissey (and who knows, maybe an autograph?)
So I waited in the hotel lobby from about 12:30 until 3:30 AM, when I finally saw a tour bus pull up. I got a little excited, but still had my doubts about whether he would actually be there, or just his crew/band.
After a couple minutes, a couple guys got off the bus and went to the front desk to check in. The hotel lobby was completely empty except for me, so I pretended to be using the computer so I didn't look "suspicious."
The guys went back to the bus after checking in, and a few minutes later, one of them walks back off the bus, with none other than Morrissey! I saw them start to walk through the front door of the hotel, so i got up from my seat and slowly & cautiously started walking toward them. I got about 10 feet away from Morrissey, and I guess he saw me out of the corner of his eye, so he glanced in my direction, then immediately looked away when he realized i was a fan. Then his bodyguard (the "porn-star" looking guy) also noticed me, and gave me a dirty look. Then they continued to walk up the steps (which were located in the lobby.
I was disappointed of course, but not necessarily surprised. I gave up, and stayed down in the lobby as I watched Morrissey and the bodyguard ascend the stairs, then walked down the hallway at the top of the stairs (it was a balcony that overlooked the lobby). I didn't say a word to him, i just watched him from a distance. At this point, out of nowhere, the bodyguard looks down at me again and yells "I WILL KNOCK YOU OUT!!!", while Morrissey continued to walk several feet in front of him, obviously aware of what was going on but continued to look straight ahead. I just stood there, speechless, until they were out of sight.
At this point, I decided to walk up the steps and walk in the direction they were walking (that was the same direction as my hotel room anyways). As i turned the corner in the hallway, I heard a door close, then his bodyguard started walking toward me. He stopped me in the hall and said "what do you want???" i said "i was hoping to maybe get a picture with him." he said "no. no way. not at 4 in the morning." i said "ok, alright" and tried to walk to my room, but he was still blocking me. so I said "my room is down this hall" and he finally let me pass.
The whole situation has made me lose a lot of respect for Moz, though. Yes, I'm aware that he is a celebrity, and has been a celebrity for 25 years. I know he probably has fans trying to approach him on an almost daily basis, and I know it probably gets exhausting. I was not expecting him to stop and say hi to me or sign an autograph or take a picture; i was just hoping that maybe he would. But honestly i would not have been upset with him if he had simply looked at me and walked past me. I understand he can't stop for every fan that approaches him, and i would never hold that against him.
What DID bother me, though, is how his bodyguard (who, in a way, represents Moz), could say something so rude and violent to me, and Morrissey didn't give a sh*t. Here i am, a fan of 10 years, standing in an otherwise-vacant hotel lobby, doing nothing more than standing and watching my idol walk past me and ignoring me. I don't look like a freak or anything.. i just look like a normal, skinny, 26-year old guy standing there by myself holding a copy of Bona Drag and a pen. I didn't say anything to him, i didn't bombard him, I didn't do anything that could be perceived as threatening. And after you consider all this, it didn't bother Morrissey one bit that his bodyguard threatened his fan with physical violence for no reason whatsoever.
The first time I saw Morrissey (I drove 20 hours across the country to see him play in Denver in 2002), he stopped in the middle of a song to yell at the security guards who were being too rough with a fan trying to get on stage. 5 years later, he's employing a bodyguard who threatens a harmless fan with violence and it doesn't bother him at all.
I've been a die-hard fan for about 9 or 10 years now, and have spent a ridiculous amount of time and money on this man. I've seen him 7 times now (in 6 different cities), bought all of his records/singles, read hundreds of news articles/interviews with him, memorized his lyrics, introduced friends to his music... and then I finally see him in person and not only does he ignore me (which alone doesn't bother me), but he allows his bodyguard to be unnecessarily rude, violent, and disrepectful to me. The whole situation was just a huge turnoff.
You read his lyrics, and his interviews, and see him perform, and you get the impression that he is a sensitive, loving, peaceful, gentle man who cares about his fans and despises hatred and violence. But maybe that's just how he pretends to be when he has a large audience. I can understand being rude to me if i was a paparazzi, or if i was acting crazy and invading his space.. but I wasn't. I just stood there.
Maybe I'm being too sensitive, I don't know. But it just seemed really, really rude to treat a fan like that.
But I still went to the concert, and even though I had front row seats (which I've never had before), I just couldn't enjoy it as much as all the other shows I've been to. I tried listening to Your Arsenal on the way home, and I couldn't enjoy that the same way I used to either. Maybe I'll get over it eventually, but for now, I'm not the fan I used to be. It's kind of depressing.
That's what I thought. Isn't that one of the things that sets Moz apart from any other artist? That he seems to take a real interest in as many fans as he can so to speak, having that visual contact and making each one of us feel like he's speaking to each one of us individually (that is also mixed in with that connection we each feel with him)....instead of as one big group of people he could care less about??
