The Pope in the Philippines - On Morrissey, the Smiths and Panic on the streets of Manila

Morrissey in Manila
May 13, 2012 @ World Trade Center

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After missing out on the Wild Swans gig when they dropped by Manila, I was adamant not to miss out on Morrissey's first ever appearance in these shores. I was pretty sure there was ( and still is ) a ton of kids in the Philippines eagerly awaiting for this event to happen ( when's the repeat? ). I forget how I learned that he was indeed coming ( malamang sa internet ) and I had to verify that it wasn't some sort of sick joke hatched by bored netizens. I made a deal with my brother for us to go together as he's also a fan. It was through him, being a product of the original "bored" generation ( chong, XB, the Original Oktoberfest concerts, Resuce Ladders, creepers! ) that I originally got into the Smiths. Hatful of Hollow was such a breath of fresh air, the guitar arrangements were something else, kung makikinig ka sa the Smiths ngaun,  if you follow the guitar hooks parang lumulubog-lumilitaw cya e, ung tipong andun lang, surfing through the rhythm...and it still sounds new, though the music was like nothing we've heard before. It had a classic element. A lot of that has something to do with Johnny Marr, one of the greatest guitar arrangers of his ( and everyone else's? ) generation. I've seen stories from the tube ( You ) about how Johnny Marr could not even repeat some of the stuff that he recorded while working on these albums. Ganun cya kalupit, kahit sarili nya hindi nya makopya!

The cat in Morrissey's hat...May 13 2012

There's much talk about how Morrissey and Marr were the Smiths but I think that the other two had pretty huge contributions to the sound that they had. Just pick a Smith song and you'll hear the bass jumping out. Sometimes, the basslines are even more memorable than the guitar hooks, Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now is a perfect example. The drums on the other hand may seem simple enough but I think the playing was more like serving the songs, providing a steady backbeat to the rolling bass and the jangly guitar. Andy Rourke and Mike Joyce sure know how to make their parts blend into the whole. It was dissapointing how there was a messy, legal dispute between them when they broke up but that's the ugly side of being in a group. When they were one, they were solid.

Of course, Morrissey was the voice behind the music and it was his eccentricity that made him seem more human than most of the voices that were coming out at the time. I don't know about you, but his way of singing sounds quite ordinary, I don't think he does too much with his voice, just enough to make you notice. It was like how Bob Dylan's voice was described as something that was coming from you and me in the song American Pie, an everyday echo of the common man, it was like he was having a conversation with you. Even if you don't get half of what they were saying, just hearing something like that makes you want to hear more. And I feel there's a lot of vulnerability and angst at the same time coming out in the songs. When Morrissey sang with the Smiths, it was like he was saying, it's okay to be unique, it's okay to be angry and it's fine to follow your own tune and channel that anger in your own way. And that stuck a chord with a lot of us. The music wasn't aggressive ( as in buzzsaw guitars and shout out vocals ) but the whole attitude came off that way for me.

From : http://www.morrissey-solo.com/article-archive/2012/

The day of the gig came and it was a rather rainy afternoon, fitting for what was to come. When we got to the place, we saw some entrepreneurial kids who made their own t-shirts for the event, selling their wares, outside the venue. I noticed that there was a mix of young and old, nakakita pa ung utol ko ng kaklase from college and some acquaintances from way back. There were even British folks enjoying their pints before the gig. A group caught my attention and they were wearing jean jackets with The Smiths/Morrissey layout at their backs, and some of them had horn-rimmed glasses paying homage to a time when that was what Morrissey looked like ( saw the pic above in a Moz site ). Memorabilia was being sold inside, most of which we were not able to afford. Ang galing kasi ung crowd parang Ding Dong sa pagkahalo, there were the conventional looking ones pero meron din ung medyo far out ung get-up. And it was okay since parang The Smiths na din to. PETA was also there, Morrissey, of course is a vegetarian ( maybe even vegan? ) and is a spokesperson for the group. It was funny to me that a way of announcing to the mainstream media that he was arriving was through a protest letter Morrissey sent to PNoy about Mali, purpotedly being the ONLY elephant in the country and living in rather squalid conditions. Sigurado ako me kababayan tayo na umiling nung narinig to, parang aba'y sino ba tong epal na to? I didn't think he did any interviews or even lumabas sa noon time show like what the Swans did prior to the event. Classic Morrissey....

About Mali in the NY Times

The place was filled when the gig was about to start. You can feel the anticipation the crowd was feeling ( Eto na cya! Sa Wakas! ) The gig started off with video backdrops playing what I guess would be Morrissey's influences. I learned recently that he was and still is a big New York Dolls fan as I noticed a lot of the early punks were ( Ramones, the Clash, the pistols ) and there was a performance of the Dolls playing "Looking for a Kiss" shown ( 1970s me LUV na!! ). There were also black and white clips, which I assumed were films/shows he liked. And at the end of these clips there were words shown saying this is not punk...this is not rock...this is the opera...or words to that effect, I can't recall. And then we saw the man himself.

..the infamous maladjsuted cover...

My favourtie solo Morrissey album would be Maladjusted. Ewan ko ba, but when I look for stuff to read about this, parang andaming negative reviews about this release. I got this on tape and it became a staple of my tape deck and my teenage angst phase. I even read something about how the cover was a letdown kasi mukha daw kasi syang troll na nakaupo hehe...One thing I learned kasi from listening to Morrissey, his songs just grow on you. You just have to be patient even if the songs don't jump at you at the onset. Alma Matters is a very pop tune pero kung basahin mo ung lyrics me angas pa din e ( "but who asked you anyway? It's my life to wreck my own way" ), Trouble Loves Me is an ode to well, bad luck and perhaps loneliness, ( "trouble loves me, walks beside me to chide me not to guide me,it's still much more than you do, or would attempt to" ), there's mournful Papa Jack about growing up ( "and there was a time when the kids reached out but Papa Jack just turned them all away" ), being content/sarcastic in Ammunition ( "I dont need more ammunition, I have more than I can spend" ), a vengeful Sorrow Will Come in the End , probably hitting the legal battles that he had to go through ( "lawyer, liar you pleaded and you squealed and you think you've won but sorrow will come to you in the end" ) and of course the very, very sad Satan Rejected My soul. Very sad lyrics pero ung music is joyful and upbeat. That combination of extremes ( upbeat music / downbeat lyrics ) is very evident even in the early days of the Smiths.

Satan rejected my soul

He knows my kind

He won't be dragged down

He's seen my face around

He knows heaven doesn't seem

To be my home

So I must find

Somewhere else to go

I must find

Somewhere else to go

So, take it - please

It's free

You'll never see

You'll never see

All the fun in life it's cost me

Very cool vid here of this song LIVE!!!

This song reminds me of a TV show I watched once, ung mga muppets ni Jim Henson ung bida pero it was not Kermit and the wholesome gang. Mga muppets din cya pero iba iba ung kwento. I think it was titled The Storyteller...it had this one episode about a man with a sack that can hold anything, as long as he asks it to come inside the bag. With it, in one of his travels, he played cards with devils ( of course he was cheating with magic cards who the fuck would play cards with the devils using honest cards??? ). The devils dialogue went this way:

Devil 1: Is he cheating?
Devil 2: Well, I am and I'm still losing!

So, as the imps were about to gang up on him for cheating them, he asked the devils to come into his bag.E di nadale ung mga demonyo ayus! Pati Death natalo nya because of that bag. The ending was he wasn't allowed both in heaven and hell and he was fated to roam earth forever. Maybe Morrissey watched the same show, who knows?

More about "The Storyteller":

Wiki page

Devil Clip

who is he?

In a lot of ways, Morrissey looks much tamer now, more balanced even, maybe, heaven forbid, even content? He was giving off this crooner vibe like Frank Sinatra and the others. But once he sang the first song, you know that he still has it, that his voice still speaks to you and me, about you and me. It was quite a lengthy set, I don't have the exact numbers, but in my estimate he did like 12-15 songs. ( anybody has the complete set list? ) but syempre bitin pa din. Nampucha, hindi naman naten alam kung makakabalik pa to dito so in that sense bitin talaga.  Ilang oras lang, time na para kantahin nya ung There is a Light... My brother and I were so glad that we were able to witness this event. I felt it was surreal even, who would've thought that somebody we'd listen to all of our lives would have only now to have a chance to visit here? Who knows kung mauulit pa to? The Pope of Mope has given his sermon and it was time for us to go back to our lives... to a world that still won't listen...leaving us to wonder...could life ever be sane again??