The first time I saw Morrissey perform, I was reminded of the classic line from "Rubber Ring" and felt lucky that such music existed. This time, it was more "Crashing Bores" and a general disaffection with the world. Not that Moz himself didn't try - on paper, he did play many strong songs - but this time I felt like there are some things that are better when they exist only inside your own head. Seeing them interpreted by other people, instead of making me feel not alone in being alone, produced the opposite effect.

To elaborate, the one characteristic of Moz songs is that they are emotional, and the reason that I was drawn to his songs that they expressed certain facets of my thinking very directly and eloquently. This time, I realized that not everyone takes the songs as seriously as I did, and largely still do. Which is not to say that I am a better listener or fan, because heaven knows my interpretations of what things mean is as unreliable as anyone's; but having placed so much faith in these songs, seeing them treated so frivolously makes me feel somewhat foolish. Maybe that's all they were meant to be, after all? What that makes of the hours spent in their company, I can only guess.

Of course, listening to the songs again, the answer that screams back regarding their frivolity is an emphatic No. (If otherwise, Moz would have to be one of the greatest emotional frauds that lived; an interesting proposition, and a lifestyle interesting to contemplate, but not one I could fathom being true!) But I do wonder how Moz himself takes to the crowds of people cheerfully asserting their heritage from a criminally vulgar shyness, for example. Quite possibly he's learned to move on from expecting everyone to be and think like you, a state that is childishly naive at best, dangerously solipsistic at worst. Isn't that how people grow up?