Morrissey Returns to Canada ... and Some Pre-Halloween Ghostliness

The past few weeks have been exciting for Morrissey fans, especially if you’re a Canadian Morrissey fan. Recently we have learned that Moz and the band are working on a covers album, which currently seems to be recorded as those who don’t live in LA have now left. A number of California tour dates have also been announced, including an LA date with special guest Joan Jett, a San Diego date with guests Starcrawler, a festival date in Long Beach, and a Halloween gig in Ventura. Halloween Morrissey gigs are always special, as often band and audience members dress up in costumes, and since Halloween seems to be the only holiday I get excited about these days, I’m over the moon.

Morrissey in Portland, 2017

Last year, Morrissey opened his Low In High School US tour with a Halloween concert in Portland, which is, incidentally, where I am right now. Portland has quickly become one of my favourite cities in the world, due to its spectacular range of decadent vegan food and the fact that it houses the largest used and new bookstore in the world (my bookshelves and wallet shake and quake). Portland is also a touch spooky, as on the outskirts of town lies a Victorian cemetery and, previously unbeknownst to me, there is a haunted hotel, which is where I am sitting at the time of writing.

Lone Fir Cemetery, Portland

Yes I’m about to go on a (massive) tangent here, but I need to get this story out of my system. On Sunday night, I had happily returned from a book shopping binge and had just laid down on my bed, when strange sounds started infiltrating my senses. Random thumps poured through the ceiling and walls - perhaps someone was moving furniture. Vaguely, the sounds were reminiscent of tap dancing, yet in iron clogs... but arrhytmically, intermittently.  Was it from above - or beside? “Ugh... people are so annoying.” I rolled my eyes, as travelling is the only time I can find peace, due to my unpleasant neighbours at home. Then... grinding started, what on earth was that?... Like creaking rusty gears churning and turning. Was someone washing windows? Doing renovations? The front desk said “no,” they would send a repair man to investigate.

The thumps grew louder, menacingly heavy hardcore industrial metallic, followed by eerie nothingness for a few moments... and then, the creaking gears would return. I tried to gauge from whereabouts the sound came... and it seemed to move... sometimes it was adjacent, but mostly from above. The repairman arrived – and we waited for the sound to return – and waited... nothing. After nearly an hour of bizarreness, as soon as he entered my suite, the noise vanished. I tried to describe it – he checked the air conditioning, the elevator – silence. Finally the words came out - “It sounds like someone slamming CHAINS – heavy chains – like that Dickens ghost or something!” I then half-jokingly added, “Perhaps I’m being haunted.” He giggled nervously, which segued into a ponderously awkward silence, and then, he added, quite seriously, “Well I have heard stories.” He told me I could call him if the sound returned... and it hasn’t – yet.

I still have no clue what was causing the noise, but a google search informed me that I am, in fact, staying in a haunted hotel. Guests have reported strange sounds, ghostly faces in mirrors, and apparitions running from closets, sobbing in chairs, and even trying to get into bed with them (not sure I fancy that one!) Psychics have visited the spirits, and sadly, some say the ghost is of a person who threw themselves from a window on the 7th floor. Thus, the ghost is likely a tormented soul, searching for some semblance of peace in death, so elusive in life, and has been unable to find that place of eternal solace. After the initial jolt of learning a ghost could be sharing my quarters, I felt a strange kinship with the phantom, and apologized that life had been so dire that death’s pull became unavoidably irresistible, whether due to sudden grief-fueled impulse or to years of dragging pain. Somewhere, someone perhaps knows the entire story.  Anecdotes say that, in spite of whatever he went through in life and death, the ghost is rather mischievous, and from my experience, he is. Further, hanging out with a ghost is dramatically more appealing than being at home and dealing with my inconsiderate landlords and their tantrum prone children, anyway.

Cemetery in Praha, Texas

This wouldn’t be my first experience with ghosts, as I felt one's presence before at a cemetery in Texas, among other momentary visitations. In general I am not afraid of them, as I believe they rarely mean harm, and in some cases may even be visiting to comfort us. From Morrissey’s Autobiography, we can see he too has had experiences with ghosts; for example, in the Moors passage, which is one of the most beautifully written, page turning sections of the book:

“We know this [that they have seen a ghost] to be true and our hearts sink. In fact, we knew this to be true as soon as the vision hit our eyeline, and this was why we were all so instantly overcome with grief.” p. 237

“There may very well be spirits of 1780 who still roam, begging for release by prayer, buried without ceremony, out of the way, beyond gaze, blotted out of creation just for knowing too much, or for saying too much, or for being witness to some dark crime; rent boys and runaways, troubled teens and latchkey kids, motherless druggies and hastily pregnant Carol Annes, now silenced good and proper, deliberately dumped so far from their homes that even a most determined spirit could not find its way back” pp. 238-239

According to Goddard’s Mozipedia, Morrissey has also spoken of ghostly presences in his family home on Kings Road, his flat in Kensington, and a studio called Hook End Manor near Reading. (pp 143-144). In a 2007 interview with LA Weekly, “Moz The Cat," (one of my favourite EVER interviews) Morrissey expressed interest in staying in a haunted castle: “I wouldn’t think twice about spending a weekend in a haunted castle, with no electricity, no lights, no air. I’d be very happy to do that. Doesn’t it all depend upon how receptive the brain is, how open the brain is?”

Morrissey and Canada

Now, let's rewind a few days to last Thursday, when Morrissey made an announcement that completely surprised me, as I’d never even really dreamed it would happen. I had just woken up and my phone began buzzing with a tornado of notifications... words flashing onto my screen... “Morrissey... Canada...” I blinked, trying to make sense of snippets of info, while still in that slight fog of slumber – and then, I saw the post on Morrissey Central.

My comprehension, dulled by sleepy excitement, stumbled at first, but then I realized...

Morrissey is returning to Canada – my home country! I’ve never known a time when I didn’t have to leave my country to see Morrissey, so for me and many others this is huge. People have often asked me if I believed Moz would return to Canada one day, and I genuinely didn’t know what to say, as for me it was too emotionally intense to get my hopes up. I have always respected his reasoning for not touring Canada, as the ban was in protest of the barbaric seal hunt, a senseless bloodbath that violently rips away hundreds of thousands of innocent lives a year (the humane society estimates more than 1,000,000 seal deaths in the last 5 years) Therefore, I truly understood his protest, as I am personally disgusted that such brutality occurs on my country’s shores. Many of us who live here do not want the seal hunt and write letters, sign petitions, and protest such despicable cruelty. The government repeatedly turns a deaf ear, as politicians often do, when it comes to concerns regarding animal cruelty.

Morrissey’s outspokenness about the seal hunt has, in the past, included a public battle with former fisheries minister, 78% pork girth Gail Shea, who lost her riding in 2015 to a politician who is -  coincidentally - also named Morrissey. While researching for an article about this around 2 years ago, I found a video of Shea taking a pie in the face by a PETA activist, which I recommend as highly enjoyable viewing.

Morrissey will be making donations to animal charities in each Canadian city he visits, including Toronto Pig Save, Ottawa Animal Save, St. John’s Chicken Save, and Vancouver Chicken Save, stating “we are here to save as many lives as possible.” The thought of all the precious Canadian animals Morrissey’s donations, message, and activism will help is beautiful. With unthinkable horrors like factory farming, abuse, and hunting, animals need us more than ever, and I know all of our Canadian animal friends will be so thankful to Morrissey for his support. As of the day of writing, no Canadian tour dates have been announced, but anticipation is certainly in the air and flowing through our veins.

Meanwhile, out of interest, I thought I’d impart a touch of Morrissey-related Canadian trivia. I should also add that yes, my face hurt from smiling (I am not typically a BIG smiler) for at least 12 hours straight upon hearing the news that my favourite artist and human would finally be visiting my home country (a dream!)

Morrissey’s Touring History of Canada:

According to Setlist FM, Morrissey has appeared live 9 times in Canada, with 5 dates in Ontario, 3 in British Columbia, and 1 in Quebec. His first ever Canadian tour date was on July 5^th, 1991, at Kingswood Music Theatre in Vaughan, Ontario for the Kill Uncle Tour, and the last time he appeared in Canada was October 12, 2004 at Hummingbird Centre in Toronto for the You Are The Quarry Tour.

Here is a chronological list of all 9 past dates:

July 5^th, 1991: Vaughan, Ontario: Kingswood Music Theatre. Kill Uncle Tour.

October 28^th, 1991: Vancouver, British Columbia: Pacific Coliseum. Kill Uncle Tour.

September 15^th, 1992: Toronto, Ontario: Maple Leaf Gardens. Your Arsenal Tour.

October 5^th, 1992: Vancouver, British Columbia. Your Arsenal Tour.

September 12^th, 1997: Toronto, Ontario: Massey Hall. Maladjusted Tour.

September 13^th, 1997: Montreal, Quebec: Theatre St-Denis. Maladjusted Tour.

October 2^nd, 1997: Vancouver, British Columbia: Orpheum Theatre. Maladjusted Tour.

February 16^th, 2000: Hamilton, Ontario: Hamilton Place Theatre. Oye! Esteban Tour.

October 12^th, 2004: Toronto, Ontario: Humming Bird Centre. You Are The Quarry Tour.

This means, at the time of writing, Morrissey hasn’t held a concert in Canada for nearly 14 years, and he hasn’t appeared in my province, British Columbia, for almost 21 years. Morrissey’s return is fantastic news for Canadian fans who cannot travel, and even for those of us who can, it's an exhilarating thought that Morrissey will sing on our home soil.

More Morrissey and Canada Trivia:

- Pamela Anderson, who appeared in Morrissey’s spoken word video for Earth Is The Loneliest Planet, was born in Ladysmith, British Columbia, Canada. Not only a beautiful actress and model, Anderson also tirelessly campaigns for animal welfare and veganism with PETA. In an interview for Hot Press, Morrissey once said of Anderson, “having met Pamela Anderson and Patrick Dempsey, well, they’re both quite beautiful, and if at least one of them doesn’t turn you on, then you're probably dead.”

Morrissey with Pamela Anderson

- Morrissey has expressed fondness for the novel, At Grand Central Station I Sat Down And Wept, by Canadian author Elizabeth Smart

- Morrissey admires Canadian singer Buffy Sainte-Marie saying in a 1999 Q Magazine interview, “I can... appreciate people like Buffy Sainte-Marie. I thought she had a great voice and great passion.”  Sainte-Marie was Morrissey’s special guest for his 2015 Spring UK tour.

Morrissey and Buffy Sainte-Marie
Source: TTY

And – finally, I must add

- Canada is a very good place for wearing cardigans, as it can get quite chilly (yes, I had to tie cardigans in somehow)

Photo by @mischievousnose

For more information on Canadian animal charities, and for information on how to contact the Canadian government regarding the seal hunt, please visit the following links:

http://www.torontopigsave.org/

https://www.facebook.com/ottawaanimalsave/

https://www.facebook.com/stjohnsfas/

https://www.facebook.com/vancouverchickensave/

https://support.peta.org/page/1144/action/1?locale=en-US

https://www.peta.org/issues/wildlife/wildlife-factsheets/seal-slaughter/

While in Canada, beware of
raccoons stealing your toast

Low In High School: A Fashionably Late Review and Poll

“Do you ever say what you really feel?” Morrissey sings in All The Young People Must Fall In Love.

With 8 simple words, we are confronted with a question that isn’t exactly easy to face about ourselves, or others. The superficiality of human existence is nothing new, harkening back to stiff Victorian parlour room airs and beyond, but our 21st century world can also feel restrictive, with an urge to present an ideal life of perfect skin, relationships, and holidays via filtered Instagram photos and Fakebook updates. However, the filtered self can leave us feeling trapped and unfulfilled, and perhaps this is part of a larger, looming construct of control, where self-expression and unique thought are frowned upon. Self-censorship can overtake your life with such subtlety, you might not even realize it.

Low in High School poster at a London tube station

Morrissey’s 11^th solo studio album, Low In High School, pries open our eyes to face the situation in which humanity currently finds itself. The record is both timely and timeless, with lyrics addressing forces that relentlessly batter our spirits, minds, and even our bodies:

Police.

Politics.

The media.

Religion.

- just to name a few.

What do all of these entities have in common?

Desire to control.

On Low In High School, Morrissey has us investigating the question of freedom in its many facets: physical, intellectual, emotional. Yet, simultaneously, he is able to so beautifully weave threads of hope: love, creativity, freedom, through such heavy topics – reflecting our own delicate balancing acts between cynicism and an aching longing for more (which may be the one thing that keeps us going).

Morrissey and his band on the Low In High School Tour
in Dublin, 2018

As my horrid landlords are away, I’ve been enjoying a small, blissful jag of quiet around here, so decided I’d just scribble some thoughts down in a notebook about each song on the album. My goal is to avoid being too long winded (which is a habit of mine) and just extract a few little slices of thought and feeling that occur to me... so under 100 words* per song? Deal!

Let’s delve in:

My Love I’d Do Anything For You

Hard-hitting opening track with blazing brass. Puts the media’s propagantagonistic tactics to question as well as jabs directed at the typical yawn-inducing, formulaic life of employment – are we all slaves? Tightrope walk of cynicism about general world yet with hope (albeit dwindling) for romance – but with doubt such longing can be met. Some hope and some despair - how very Moz! Ultimately an empowering song with bold swaggering elephants, somehow... do you hear them too?

I Wish You Lonely

A throbbing bassline builds this song from the bottom up – smooth yet ruthless. The “tombs are full of fools” refrain hits powerfully – with lost causes we lustily throw our lives into in attempts to find purpose – monarchy, battle, the glue trap of romance-gone-wrong, and drugs – all opiates in a sense, to avoid thinking of, yet further hurling us into, the inevitable. Morrissey’s voice is fierce passion as he sings of the last tracked humpbacked whale: “never giving in, never giving in.” Pure goosebumps.

Photo via http://mentalfloss.com/

Jacky’s Only Happy When She’s Up On The Stage

Dark tones with a groovy feel – Jacky, our troubled artist, channels all the pains and losses of ‘real life’ into her art. “Free in the truth of make believe...” Do we create our own truths? The creative soul burns to escape. Reality comes crashing as the curtain drops and everyone rushes to the exit, leaving Jacky alone once more – instrumental and vocal chaos reflect this trauma.

Home Is A Question Mark

Mystical, beautiful... like silent woods at dawn, sleighbells create atmosphere, merging into echoing, mournful guitar phrases. “I hug the land, but nothing more...” A stray soul’s struggle to find home in whatever form - longing for a sense of belonging – and love - runs through Home’s heart-fueled lyrics. Morrissey’s voice glides smoothly up the high notes, and as strings crescendo, they fall back and we are left with the quiet heartbeat of the bass and...

“Home... is it just a word,

Or is it something you, carry within you?”

(Well, I wonder...)

And then, that last, beautiful climax... “If I ever get there, would you meet me?”

Spent The Day In Bed

Catchy upbeat keyboards and a luxurious endorsement for self-care. Also features some of the charming self-deprecating humour Moz is so brilliant at: “I’m not my type but I love my bed.” A fun song, but also with important messages – for your own sanity, avoid the news, which pummels us down into misery, and makes us feel helpless.

I Bury The Living

Another song wrapping us in atmosphere – crickets, the lone violin... then the attack – drums and guitars in a combat-booted gallop. A high-drama guitar driven masterpiece, Bury leads us into the psychological depths of warfare – a lure for the masses - “wretched outcast[s] with no point of view” to find identity in a ‘cause,’ misunderstood, and erupting with destruction. At times it’s hard to tell if the soldier is brainwashed, or enjoys killing: perhaps a little of both. The echoing, menacing “honour mad cannon fodder” chant climaxes in distorted rage. Toxic masculinity and futile violence persist, and soldiers become toe-tagged numbers... and the war goes on...

I Bury The Living live at Alexandra Palace

In Your Lap

A love song in the midst of uprisings, upheaval, and violence. Winding piano notes at times swell into thunderstorms. In Your Lap reflects a sense of longing while existing in a time that is disturbed, undone, and corrupted by power. I am curious about the little accents of sound throughout, whispers of crunchy chaos: are they references to the surrounding unrest, or ghosts of memories? The image of “dreaming of touching your arm,” a simple, beautiful, innocent gesture... so far removed from pepper-spraying officers and governments aiming to cause pain.

The Girl From Tel Aviv Who Wouldn’t Kneel

In a world where we are “put into our place” by those in power and by rigid traditional systems, the protagonist in this song bows down to no one. “Humble homes with mottos on the wall, symbols and signs in framed designs. Sure to keep the poor, poorer... in fear of a God who couldn’t save them after all”: religion also tethers people to controlled systems, keeping them from living the way they truly want to. Intricate piano and accordion notes give the track extra vibrancy.

All The Young People Must Fall In Love

Tambourines and a walking bass line lend a slight 70’s folky vibe. Nuclear war, corrupt presidents – all cause unspeakable damage – yet there’s also good in the world: love. Do those of us who are older lose sight of that? Many people are all words, but without meaning: “Do you ever say what you really feel?”

When You Open Your Legs

Exotic flair: chirping castanets, flamboyant trumpets, and Spanish guitars. Cheeky and rather naughty, this song induces wild blushing in those of us who are slightly shy, but it’s also a hip grinder. Flirty call and response conversation between instrumental and vocals seduce us... and “everything I know deserts me now...”: is sex the ultimate distraction? As an aside, I keep trying to picture Morrissey getting thrown out of a club at 4 a.m.

Morrissey singing When You Open Your Legs
in front of the Artist Colony backdrop

Who Will Protect Us From The Police?

Sirens. Distortion. Danger. “Say, Daddy, who will protect us?” The police claim to protect and to serve, but actions of corruption and brutality prove otherwise. Ganglord Pt. 2. “We must pay for what we believe.” Dark horns, chaotic chords. And no, don’t look to God to save you: "baby please run." Morrissey sings for crisis-ridden Venezuela at the end of the track.

Israel

Opening chord is a deep haunting, velvety rumble, falling way into delicate, sensuous piano phrases. Religion's life-crushing restrictions, a punishing God, and existential torment paint dark imagery in the song's verses: “we're all bones and flesh and shell.” There’s a significant line oft-ignored by critics: “I can’t answer, for what armies do... they are not you...” As Morrissey sings “Israel” his voice nimbly tilts across notes.

“Earth is just one big asylum

An explosive prison cell

See us squirm in our own damaged spell.”

Weeping violins intensify the pain and beauty of the song. Exquisite

I’m admittedly pretty late in reviewing Low In High School, as it’s been playing in my car for months... but a thoughtful listen has reaffirmed for me how cohesive this album truly is: it highlights our attempt to make sense of life while retaining a fragment of hope for more in the face of a damaging world bent on controlling us. Sometimes I think of Low in High School as a coming-of-age album, which fits quite neatly with the title (I could be miles off with this by the way, this is only my personal thinking) – as often during our teenage years (high school) we begin to question what we have been told by our parents, teachers, the media, and others. Many times throughout our lives we go through this same process of questioning, whether we are 16, 36, or 60; however, this is not an easy journey. In a sense, we are continually “coming of age”, in varying formations.

My favourite pieces of art (music, literature, theatre) leave me wondering whether they are cynical or optimistic, which means they have captured the essence of the very delicate, very human struggle of trying to make sense of the best and worst of life. For me, I think this album does exactly that.

Morrissey live at Royal Albert Hall 2018

And now, out of interest, I'll give you the very unscientific results of a little write-in Instagram poll I made the other week:

What’s Your Favourite Song From Low In High School?

Answers were all over the map - which is a testament to how strong an album it is. Final results were:

Tied with one vote each: Jackys Only Happy When She's Up On The Stage, In Your Lap, and All The Young People Must Fall in Love

Tied with two votes each: The Girl From Tel Aviv Who Wouldn't Kneel, My Love I'd Do Anything For You, Israel, and When You Open Your Legs

In 3rd place, with 4 votes: I Bury The Living

In 2nd place, with 6 votes: I Wish You Lonely

And in 1st place, with 11 votes: Home Is A Question Mark 


I'll leave you with a beautiful lost track posted by Sam earlier this week: Blue Dreamers Eyes:

* yes, I know I went a little over a couple times ;)

Could Life Ever Be Sane Again?

Europe sprawls a labyrinth of diverse cities and cultures, its map a puzzle of histories told and untold over centuries: inconceivable to mere human spans of time. As a North American, it’s awe-inspiring to see vaulted stone buildings erected over 1,000 years ago, so much finer than strips of box stores and strip malls and uncomplex apartment complexes abundant in my corner of the planet. It’s an okay place to be stuck in, even if you’re sad. I like distractions – and there is enough sensory distraction that, while walking down such overflowing streets, for some forgivable moments, you can even forget your own thoughts.

The magnificent old Europe: Prague

I understand why people want to conserve Europe and its cultures – even though I admittedly have a fairly non-existent sense of national identity; Canadians are really just polite people who play hockey and eat maple syrup, or so I hear. I also understand the desire, through immigration and other means, to help those who are in dire need and live in constant danger in their birth countries, and will risk their own breath, flesh, and bones, to escape. It’s also true that introducing different cultures allows us to experience a mosaic of cuisine, voices, art – and yet, no culture is perfect - and religions in particular may pose troubling, even dangerous complexities. Both an abundance of immigration and a lack of immigration have drawbacks – and this is too complex an issue to discuss here – and not the purpose of what I have to say.

Political conversations are scary. Religious conversations are scary too. People get very intense, very angry. They say these topics should always be avoided on first dates – or the divorce will likely occur before the first kiss. And yet - we are tethered to a backdrop of morals and systematic structures that are injected into unsuspecting us, from birth, so slowly it is difficult to step back and think critically about all we have been told. Absorb, absorb, absurd? Questioning these topics is productive, but uncomfortable.

A few weeks ago, it was 5 am and I was crying alone in a Manchester hotel room. I had been crying for a few hours, and the tears wouldn’t stop, which frightened me. Depressed me knows all about crying, it’s nothing new; however, sometimes a strange breed of tears occur, tears that just won’t physically stop, even when the mind and body are seemingly cried out, empty, exhausted, like the death rattle of a gas tank on a desert road trip. Sobbing, I guess would be a more specific verb to describe this, but that doesn’t quite capture it either.

For weeks I had been planning to go on the Morrissey tour, to 9 tour dates in 8 cities, in 5 countries. Train and airplane tickets would blaze me across varying countrysides and cities and languages in less than a month. Currencies and tickets in hand, I was finally going to visit continental Europe for longer than a mere 48 hours. However, as most Morrissey fans who follow him around the world would agree, sightseeing is a sweet side effect, and we are mainly here for the man who wrote the songs that saved our lives.

Morrissey singing during his successful UK tour in 2018

I touched down in Manchester after a not-so-bad flight, checked into my hotel, and was sitting in Arndale Centre finally eating some better-than-airplane food when the official announcement came.

Bad news hits in waves, the first wave comes as questions, confusion (no, it can’t be, or is not real), the next wave comes in numbness (shock and shaking hands), and the tidal wave of news eventually comes as a flow of tears. The waves crash onto the shore of your consciousness so fast your actual understanding of the situation sometimes cannot even yet grasp its reality (the worst I ever felt this was when I learned my 15 year old cat was dying: I just couldn’t make sense of it at first).

This time the bad news was cancellation of the entire Morrissey tour. My sadness wrapped around the fact I wouldn’t be seeing him, and an aching, plunging sense of missing him: for many of us, these concerts bring us pure joy – and a feeling of belonging, which we have trouble finding in everyday life. Then questions began their trek of my late-night consciousness: Is Morrissey okay? What would I do with myself alone overseas? Would I still be seeing my friends? Do I just fly back to the question mark of home? All of this upset and confusion of course stimulated more tears – but it’s the behaviour I witnessed on social media that nudged into the core of my pain – and now, on reflection, I think that’s what triggered their unstoppable flow.

It was nothing short of hypocritical, tasteless, witch-hunt level hatred.

Social media mushroomed into a hotbed of grotesque insults and twisting of words, bandwagon bullying, and hit-and-run nasty internet digs at already-hurting fans... And many people who professed to be so sensitive towards the suffering of other humans were in fact the most indulgent ringleaders of such behaviour. The schoolyard of internet anonymity was fully ablaze – and Morrissey was the target – simply for speaking his mind. Anyone who showed support was sure to be hit with the crossfire.

No wonder people are afraid to say what they think or feel.

I hurt for Morrissey and his bandmates, I hurt for my friends, and I hurt for the state of the world.

More beautiful old Europe: The Scott Monument

Our group is perhaps a microcosm for scary times... times where you must tacitly agree and say the ‘correct’ thing or face rapid-fire groupthink backlash. Intelligent debate dies and erupts into thoughtless name-calling. On Twitter, people who had never met me, never spoken with me, were calling me – and my very sweet friends - ‘racist’ because we love Moz – and continue to support him. This carried on for days, and one person I considered an acquaintance tore into me quite badly while I was trying to enjoy the Gothic magnificence of the Scott Monument in Edinburgh... Let me tell you, if you begin crying on those towering spires, you will, rightly so, attract some concerned looks. So, I turned notifications off on my phone and found sympathy from a gargoyle. Fascinatingly, or perhaps not – it was mostly white males who attacked me – and in the same sentence would throw in a sexist slur and inform me I am confused, privileged, and emotionally blinded with an invalid opinion. Sexists calling me racist for standing by my favourite artist – oh, my head.

My opinion is simply this – I do not have to precisely agree with someone’s politics to continue to care for them and admire them. I do not throw away my friends for disagreeing with their political opinions, so why would it be any different for the artist who has given me so much joy and inspiration? It just doesn’t make sense. You do not start a hate campaign against a family member because you disagree with their politics – if you have such a problem with a political party or viewpoint – would it not make far more sense to focus your energy towards the party itself? Morrissey has guided me through hard times, and helped me feel understood when I’ve felt lost -  how could I not love him? He has created timeless songs, tirelessly promoted animal welfare, and yes, he's saved human lives as well. The worst of the keyboard warriors, who in words claim to be so virtuous, let their actions speak otherwise: what have they done other than spread misery, anger, even slander?

This isn’t to say one must always agree – it is fine to disagree because that stimulates thoughtfulness and change. However, as I said earlier, intelligent debate appears to be sputtering and dying in its last breaths. There is nothing wrong with openly discussing varying opinions – but somehow along the line we have lost this ability. Name-calling, personal attacks, unjustly calling people ‘racist’ - do not promote discussion of complex issues – and the terrible, unfortunate truth is, it will hinder other people from speaking their minds

So, my sobs were intensified by what I saw as a vicious witch-hunt directed at someone I truly care for, and - even if I have never met him personally, I do love Morrissey. He interacts with kindness towards his fans and at heart I believe him to be a kind person with good intentions – but he is also a challenging person – a person who is not afraid to say things that some may find abrasive – things that confront our thoughts and beliefs – things that make us question the world around us. This is rare in popular singers, but it has been known to happen: other artists from John Lennon to Kanye West have also experienced reactionary response to their outspokenness.

The reaction to Morrissey, however, has been particularly virulent and bitter: which begs the question, why? Part of it is, undoubtedly, an increasing obsession with ‘political correctness’ - which verges on censorship. But another factor, I believe, boils down to relationships – and people understandably feel they have a very personal relationship with Morrissey, because he exposes so much of his soul in his art. I may be wrong in the following observation, but it seems that older fans especially, those who grew up with the Smiths, have been the most vocally antagonistic towards Moz. I personally cannot wrap my head around how these fans can, with brutal fickleness, throw away what has been such a big part of their life and development, but my hunch is that they built too much of their own reflection into Moz, thus ignoring that he is also human with a right to his own unique views. I have probably been guilty of this myself at times, and likely, most of us do this to the people who strike the strongest chords in our souls. Humans long to feel less alone, so we look to others to help explain the complications of being alive, of existence, to us. Beings who touch us so deeply are rare discoveries, and sometimes we spend our entire lives looking for them. Therefore, if we find an artist who can break down our barriers, we might expect something terribly unrealistic, which is, for them to become an object; in simple words, we want the artist (or friend, or lover – whoever it may be) to become an exact mirror to ourselves. This is an undeniably unfair position to put another human being into, and artists are human beings (not 40% paper mache!) So, the forlorn teen, who, in the 1980’s, lay on their bed looking up at Smiths posters - the teenager that still exists in many fans - seems unable to cope with their idol holding differing views to their own. At some point, the artist has been dehumanized, and is not permitted the right to his or her own opinions. As we all know, break ups can get very nasty.

No wonder most artists are afraid to express their own views.

But the things you once loved Morrissey for: his braveness and boldness - which he so humanly, so beautifully, so eloquently exposes simultaneously with his own vulnerability and fragility, are now the things you condemn him for.

So, while trying to make the best of my undoubtedly saddened time in Europe, these thoughts would drift in and out of my head as I walked down cobbly streets throbbing with July heat. Cemeteries filled with monuments to lives lived before ours, squares surrounding crumbling statues, and cathedrals stretching towards the sky with hope of a better beyond – all of these altered stones hold secrets of history’s faults and flaws and ravages. Do we learn from them? Or do we repeat ourselves in seemingly endless cycles of confusion?

Censorship and destruction of free speech cannot bring peace – one only needs to visit the Museum of Communism in Prague to see the devastation this can create for art and the questioning mind. It wasn’t so long ago that even fairly tales were dismantled and reconfigured. Our artists ought to be the ones who help us better understand ourselves and the world by challenging our views. By viciously attacking those we disagree with, rather than – simply disagreeing and trying to learn more – we will only promote monotony, stagnation, decay, and more hatred and division.

Has censorship helped us in the past?
Via the Museum of Communism, Prague

I admire Morrissey’s courage to speak his mind. In these times, this is an incredibly brave thing to do.

I will continue to support and love him: peer pressure cannot change my feelings and thoughts, and the beauty he has created will stand the test of time, of this I feel sure.