By Lindsay Wallace
NEW YORK — On Wednesday night, legendary former Smiths frontman Morrissey took the stage of New York's Webster Hall as part of his Years of Refusal tour. And after 25 solid years as a recording artist, the show proved that despite earlier cancellations in the tour due to illness, Moz is still going strong.
Even longtime fans would have been surprised by the energy in the room when Moz hit the stage for the first time (possibly because he opened with the 1983 Smiths classic "This Charming Man"). Not only was his voice powerful and his performance dramatic, but the crowd was like a pack of rabid animals. The floor shook and throbbed, and it took effort to even move an arm to snap a photo.
Morrissey prowled the stage, occasionally stopping to make comments. In the midst of the sweat-filled dancing and screaming crowd, one fan yelled, "I can't wait to take a shower!," to which Morrissey commented in his inimitable blasé tone, "And what's it all for?" as he turned and walked to the back of the stage.
Morrissey peppered his set with solo hits and songs from his recent album, Years of Refusal, mixed in with classic Smiths songs like "How Soon Is Now?"
During one of the few mellow ballads, “Seasick, Yet Still Docked,” a girl toward the front of the crowd began picking fights, throwing punches and pulling hair in an apparent effort to get closer to the stage.
Moz clearly saw this happening as he was crooning away — and though displeasure registered on his face, he didn’t stop singing.
Moz ended with an encore of "First of the Gang to Die," and, as he often does, quickly left the stage. His hurry to get out of the venue was made apparent when he complained that his dressing room was "a closet and a bucket."