I Started Something I Couldn't Finish
A Morrissey concert is an exciting event, especially if you love him, and it's quite reminiscent of the tracklist of the Greatest Hits album that he's released this year. Morrissey is still one of the greatest singers on Earth. Very few people can sing this way, with such power. I would like to explain why I find it so beautiful, but it seems to me to be impossible. You either get English rock or you don't.
In England like in England, the show lasts exactly an hour and a half. The encore is short, but it includes This Charming Man [sic], to hear and to die. Towards the end Morrissey removes his shirt for the last time. It's a blue buttoned shirt. His body is sweaty, his face is dripping. He's holding the shirt by one of its shoulders and leads it along the stage as if it were a pet. Once, in 1984, he did it with gladiolas. To be honest, with the shirt it's cuter.
Jacky arrives backstage again and leads us to the really closed domain. We walk a couple of hundred meters by foot until we reach a small piece of grass with a sunshade in its middle. A white wooden fence surrounds it and in the entrance there's a guard, of course, even though very few people actually make it so far. Jacky lets us inside and says that Morrissey will arrive soon.
We take two beers and sit by one of the table. Two young guys ask if they can sit with us. "Who are you?", I ask. "I'm Liam, and we're from a band, we're called the Courteeners". "Okay", I answer, "you might be surprised, but I'm familiar with your debut album." This Liam is very excited to meet Morrissey for the first time. "Think about it, a year ago I was still selling shirts in Manchester, and look where I am now".
The Courteeners are another one of those bands that came from Manchester with the British rock press immediately hailing them as the direct descendents of Morrissey and possibly the next Smiths. Since the Smiths broke up there have been dozens, if not hundreds, of such band. Most of them disappear after an album and a half without leaving a mark. But the Courteeners are exactly in that moment of making a mark, and this Liam is very excited.
Not far from me I spot Chrissie Hynde. She's 57 years old and looks great. A thin figure, well put inside black jeans, with her face shining. Next to her stands a tall, charismatic fellow who looks pretty pleased with himself, and they keep giggling all the time. Apart from them, there are no more than ten people around us. Everyone's waiting.
Morrissey arrives after fifteen minutes. He's still with the same shoes that he wore in our meeting and performed in tonight. Naturally, he showered and changed clothes. He looks very calm and hearty. He elegantly scans the site with his eyes, and understands who's present. Hynde is the first that falls upon him and showers him with compliments. From the side, it sounds like these hollow compliments, standard but not burdensome. Morrissey responds politely and nods.
After a couple of minutes he leaves her for a moment and marks us to get near. He introduces us to Hynde, who immediately starts a long speech about the Israeli son of a bitch who was her boyfriend during the last year and left her. "I even left his apartment to his parents", she says bitterly. I try to understand what his name was, but she's not one to be fooled so easily. "You probably don't know him. He's totally not a cool guy like you. He's someone else", she says. "Come to Israel, we'll fix you up with someone better", I try to calm her. "There are a lot of guys in Tel Aviv". Hynde actually has good memories from her show in Israel, but when she starts digging deeper into the romance that was, Morrissey interferes and changes the subject.
He introduces us to Russell, the guy who's standing near us. "He's a famous comedian over here", he explains to us in this tone we use to explain things to third world guests. "What's your last name?", I ask Russell, and he politely answers "Brand". I notice that people around me are a little terrified that I don't know who he is, but Russell, like a good actor, understands immediately that he has to make Lior and me fall for him, and starts with some very funny monologues.
Only the morning after, at the airport, when his face will smile at me from the front page of Q magazine, I'll understand that he's the hottest man in Britain, that he was fired from MTV a couple of years ago after arriving to an interview with Kylie Minogue dressed as Bin Laden, and that now he's on his way to take over Hollywood. It turns out that there's a part in his daily radio show called "Making Morrissey Unhappy", where he talks about stuff that will probably annoy Morrissey. Morrissey seems to enjoy this part very much. Who said that he can't laugh about himself.
While the conversation is going on we're joined by a blonde lady, motherly looking, shining and friendly, and two of her 20-year old sons. Say hello to Morrissey's sister and his two cousins, who arrived from Manchester and give the whole event a completely domestic feeling. In front of the cousins who ask regular questions such as for how long are you going to be in London ("two days"), where are you going then ("Switzerland"), and where then ("not to Barcelona"), Morrissey seems for the first time like a gentle, standard man, around my age. It's obvious that he likes his cousins very much, and it seems that he has a normal relationship with them.
Time passes, Morrissey drinks quite a few Coronas and doesn't abstain from burping. He's nice with Liam and his friends from the Courteneers and puts two CD-Rs that they give him in the pocket of his suit. Sarah, his manager, brings an Italian journalist who makes a lot of noise, and there's also a veteran, admired BBC broadcaster named Janice Long. The feeling is very domestic. Whoever arrived here belongs to the small club of people that Morrissey agrees to have around him.
Naturally, no one asks for autographs or photos, neither with cameras nor with cellphones. The conversations, as nice as they are, remain correctly polite. I stare at Lior and understand that this meeting is a bit of a reparation. Morrissey tells me that he already managed to leaf through the Tel Aviv City Guide. "I understand that Habitat [an Israeli deluxe furniture store] is the store for me", he smiles, and adds "I also read the article that you wrote at the beginning of the book, a pretty article. I especially liked the concluding sentence", and then he quotes it.
I confess, I'm excited. Finally, not only did we meet, he also understands that I'm worth something. He's quoting a sentence that I wrote.