I’ve decided to post this unedited version. I kind of tackle some existential thoughts I’ve been having – which feels slightly unwise but I am just so tired of feeling I should censor or bend myself for other people whose opinions I shouldn’t really care about. Enjoy it.
The five-hour flight from Sydney to Perth is simply a glimpse of time once you’ve crossed the Pacific ocean from North America all the way to Australia. Everything is relative, I suppose, and that applies to time and distance: two seemingly impossible factors to ever fully control, as much as we’d like to. Nothing frightens me about flying itself except the people, and people have confused and frightened me for my whole life. Being in the sky and looking out at the sprawling landscape below, cracked beiges and olive greens, makes everything feel huge and endless. It’s not until you arrive in Australia, so unfathomable from across the globe, that you realize how big the country actually is.
The terrain looks unknowable, wild, and vast, and I wonder what kinds of, if any, animals live down on that dry, scaly land. I’m so happy to be away, if only for a few weeks, from my hometown where being an alien is painful. My own sense of inadequacy for not fitting into such a life of boxed stores, boxed houses, and boxed lives never really leaves: a birthmark of guilt and confusion. However, when I’m away, none of that really matters and feeling alien morphs into a sort of delicious freedom. And now I’m on a plane, the closest I’ll ever be to becoming a migratory bird, nestless and restless, and Australia waits below.
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| Koala street art |
And yet, on landing in Perth, my body can’t quite keep up with the excitement, or the intensity of my mind. I realize I still need rest from jetlag, and I inwardly curse the aches, pains, and lines that separate me, with layers of dust and rust, from the youthful sparks I know somehow still course underneath. And I realize some wonderful people will obviously comb my writing to find out my insecurities so they can then write about me anonymously, but I will continue to say what I think and feel because I don’t believe I should censor myself simply because of other people’s issues. So there you go. Three paragraphs in. Of course people confuse and frighten me, why wouldn’t they?
Lounging by the hotel pool, we receive the news the Perth show is unfortunately cancelled, and I am oddly calm, remaining confident the other shows will work out. This is unusual for me, as I’m typically stereotypically a pessimist, but something feels different, and I know it’s gonna happen someday, so I make my way to Melbourne. In the ubers connecting to airports, a different world rushes by, complete with fancy exotic birds I can’t name and gnarly, flat-topped trees.
The day of the first concert in St. Kilda, we walk down the Yarra River and from afar I notice a black swan. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a black swan in person before, so we cross the bridge over the river to get a closer look. The swan is dark and thoughtful as he elegantly, almost coyly tilts his head while paddling, making little ripples of water circle away from him. He’s alone and beautiful, the only swan amongst silver gulls and ducks, and I take his picture and begin to wonder if he’s sad. There’s a beer can floating in the water nearby. People. Sometimes I think too much.
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| Black swan in Melbourne |
The two Melbourne shows race by, more blurs in my receding memory, and I’m further invigorated, at least temporarily divorced from regular life. There are drinks with friends I haven’t seen in years, December’s summer blazes on, the street art is awesome, Morrissey’s voice is spectacular and soul-elevating, I catch one of Jesse’s guitar picks, I cry and laugh and sing at the gigs. It’s going “well” if I could maybe just turn my phone off... but the messages come in: “Do you know you’re being written about?” “On that site...” Actually, yes, just don’t remind me. People. The ones telling me, of course mean well, I think?... should I know? Probably. Does it matter? I’m not sure. To hide away seems like giving in: posting photos and writing are some small things I enjoy. I vacillate between the quiet power of ignoring it, and the emotionally-driven one of reacting. I’m euphoric one moment, then desperately sad the next, but... to be fair, I’ve always been like that, so I don’t think anything has changed, and maybe that’s just me, background noise or not. I’ll take the euphoria for now and forget about the rest, for the euphoric bits don’t come as often.
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| Melbourne |
We fly to Brisbane. On the plane, I finish reading a book for our somewhat defunct Australian book club: Candy, by Luke Davies. I love it: the writing style, the darkness, and aching romance of the broken characters. It’s a book about heroin addiction. Reading about perfect people with perfect lives is, of course, tedious, and shattered souls reflect multifaceted reflections and rejections, which is strangely always far more beautiful. I enjoy walking through Brisbane, and in my travels I see everything from kangaroos to “bin chickens,” and I wear a sundress and drink red wine out of a massive glass.
The next morning we wake early to learn the queue has started for the only General Admission gig of the Australian tour. The list begins and is mostly regulars, save for a couple locals. By 8 am the heat already swelters and swells, and I feel so Canadian, and so pale, moving wherever I can find a gasp of shade from the sun. In my bag I have a small present for Morrissey, and I want to write him a letter, but I feel uncharacteristically wordless, perhaps from the travel, perhaps from being more overwhelmed than usual. I decide tonight is not the night for that, and I get ready with a friend in my hotel room. Queuing in the heat has made me feel ragged, and I take time to curl my hair and moisturize, and for once I dress in something more colourful and floral, but everything I do is with shaking hands. Some friends and I agree: shots are in order, and we rush into a bar across the street from the venue: Hey Chica!, as vibrant pink flamingo murals watch on.
The shots help, and we reorganize ourselves in line, this time with little sharpied numbers on our hands, which somehow always makes things feel far more secure, even though it probably doesn’t do much. At 7pm, we speed walk into the theatre, in order, and I grab the perfect spot on the barrier. Every time is the first time, and relief washes over me to be standing on the rail, waiting for pre-show videos to begin. Morrissey has added some new songs to the playlist this time: and perhaps my favourite new entry (since he added Why Can’t We Be Friends by War) is Birthday Party by French punk band Stinky Toys (that name!) Frontwoman Eli Medeiros’ delivery is so deadpan and awkward it’s sublimely sexy as she shimmies in a tiny metallic red tube dress. A gold snake necklace wraps around her neck, identical to a belt my mother once owned in the early 80’s. Like many things from my childhood, I had forgotten about the snake belt/necklace, and I suddenly remember playing dress-up with it. All I wanted was to feel pretty and important and glamorous, and the gold snake achieved just that. Birthday Party is raw and catchy, and I once again lament not having been around to witness the coolness of the 1970’s.
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| Source: YouTube |
Brisbane erupts as Morrissey enters the stage under James Baldwin’s watch. There’s a different energy to GA shows, and the audience feels more singular: a nebulous breathing, heaving being. Australian audiences, like Canadian ones, are not as rough and wild as those in the UK or LA, but they still exude a tangible, joyous gratitude, and fans sing along and reach across the barrier’s gap, which is too far from the stage for any handshakes with Moz tonight. Like magic, I am immediately freed from the cage of my own head because thoughts so similar to my own are expressed through song: “so... the life I have made may seem wrong to you...” I am revived. I Wish You Lonely remains one of my top-ever songs: it dances with poetic pessimism, it’s rhythmic with biting syllables, and like a vivid half-dream, it’s almost too keenly aware. “Tombs are full of fools who gave their life upon command/Of romance gone wrong/The same old glue and never coming true, never coming true/Tombs are full of fools who gave their life upon command/Of heroin, heroin, heroin, heroin, heroin/And never coming back, never coming back.” No wonder I live for such escape.
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| Alma Matters |
Morrissey sways and turns his head to the music, thrashing the microphone cord, as How Soon Is Now? swells upon us, infatuating like thunder, building walls of cascading, fierce notes. I much prefer the 2023 version of the song to the original Smiths version: for in 2023 it captures a lifetime of longing, and it’s edgier, and darker. With Morrissey, the song has matured into something far more powerful and defiant, and I adore that. He stands at the microphone, wearing a dark blue dress shirt, which he fiddles with and wears open at the neck to expose a large intricate turquoise necklace. “See I’ve already waited too long, and all my hope is gone...” My heart is open and wounded. Yes.
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| Morrissey and Juan Galeano |
Morrissey’s current band is, in my opinion, his best ever, consisting of 5 accomplished musicians and composers with a wealth of experience in the music industry. As a unit they’re tight, and their individual gifts blend to create something divine and dynamic. The rhythm section builds up a driving, pulsing foundation, with Juan Galeano on bass and Brendan Buckley on drums, blending primal rhythmic bliss with virtuosity. Camila Grey is on keyboards, looking cool in dark sunglasses, the keys and notes rolling effortlessly under her fingers. Guitarists Carmen Vandenberg and Jesse Tobias captivate and combine to weave a poetic spell of sound, while imparting depth and passion to the music. It’s art how each song ignites such a unique blend of new energy and lifelong emotion, and I love musicians that can convey so much through their instruments; it’s completely transcendent. For me, the pinnacle of music is when it’s not only technically good, but also captures pure feeling: this is it. The sound is simultaneously more self-aware, bold, and empowered, while retaining the vital energy of youthfulness, which is symbolic of Morrissey himself and what his music, over time, feels like to me. Plus, Moz and the band look so damn cool. It’s beyond exhilarating to witness in the flesh.
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| Carmen Vandenberg |
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| Jesse Tobias |
The setlist itself moves between super-ultra-dreamy romantic pieces like Let Me Kiss You (crooning, melancholic, impassioned) and Darling, I Hug a Pillow, which has a 60’s girl group vibe and an ethereal outro, to stinging, forceful numbers like Sure Enough, The Telephone Rings and Irish Blood, English Heart. It’s this combination, or juxtaposition, however you prefer to think of it, that makes Morrissey’s music so timeless and all-encompassing: a mixture of longing, oft-unrequited love, and bold defiance, particularly towards feeling forced to ‘fit in.’ I am two people. It’s carved into my lonely introvert’s soul as each note or lyric rescues me. We sing back to him; it’s a rare kind of electricity.
“What I was trying to say before, God interrupted me... I don’t exactly get the best press, as you may have noticed... But occasionally, about once every thirty years, if I’m in a long corridor, I’d bump into journalists who said horrendous things about me, and they’re always like little shy school girls... And isn’t it funny how people are very harsh with one another? Well I know I am.” [source: Celeste_2190, Instagram]
Morrissey leads into Half a Person, and in a way I think many of us remain “16, clumsy, and shy,” and perhaps there is no cure. It’s buried under the layers of rust and dust and one of the only constants unaffected by the passage of time. Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want is another reflective piece, almost mystical in its beckoning: “see the life I’ve had, can make a good man turn bad.” Morrissey’s lyrics spin delicate threads of hope around the ever-imposing gloom of life and somehow they elevate despair into wishing. Even the saddest songs bring comfort. The lighting dances like moonlight, and many fans stop singing and moving simply to watch in awe as his voice embraces us with its strength and beauty. It’s all gorgeous.
With two more nights in Sydney ahead, fans roll out onto Brisbane’s streets after the gig, where mismatched partygoers, booze hounds, and club kids congregate and stumble down the street. It is a Friday night, after all. The bar won’t even serve doubles after midnight, which seems harsh but possibly logical, as even by that time people seem madly drunk... or something else... and I witness everything from pastel Harajuku girls on street corners, to drunken satin brides, to old toothless gritty punk dudes. I even see a lumbering man with a huge white beard wearing a purple sequined dress; it’s a scene. And every now and then, someone passes by in a Morrissey tour tee. Thankfully, there is no such thing in life as normal.
Up next... Sydney
