Jimmy loves Nannerpus

No longer content to sit on the sidelines, Morrissey's Navy has now given up the tour and are now currently patrolling the Gulf of Aden in search of Somalia Pirates

One of the few truly wonderful things about St. Louis is the fact that no one lives here.  It’s like being the only one at Disneyland, except instead of being able to finally realize your childhood dream of making a porno inside the Lincoln Theater, you get really reasonable parking where ever you go.  So let me just say right off the bat, any concert in St. Louis is a good concert.  Even if I’ve just paid $38.50 plus service charge to watch Carrot Top’s nephew, at least I could get a drink without standing in line for 2 hours.  And honest to god, this is not a lie, but I have only had to wait in line for a toilet in St. Louis twice in the entire time I’ve been here.  So after growing up in Los Angeles concert scene, which for a kid in the suburbs meant 30 block parking, huge lines for shitty clubs with shitty bands with no air and never even a place to fucking lean.  Oh man, the Troubadour?  That place is great, a wonderful place.  But you can’t park anywhere around the place cause it’s all residential, so you have to valet, which isn’t so much about the money but the fact that everyone valets and so the line to go home is like, stupid ridiculous.  And of course the Palladium is about the size of a football stadium.  So you are standing in a sea, a vast sea, a multitude of people and just waiting.  Standing.  Not drinking so you don’t have to pee.  Waiting.  For fucking ever.  Cause shit is always running late.  Anyway, the point is that I approach this Morrissey performance from the viewpoint that is blew the fucking doors off the Tea Bag Party they threw outside my office the other day.  You should wait for that.  It will be the entry titled, Reason to Leave St. Louis, #1.  My god those folks looked stupid.  I mean, really stupid.

 I was shocked.  Not that I was expecting a bunch of lawyers and doctors, who you know,  also always vote republican, but the only people coming out to this shindig were like those kids in flower in the attic, all pale and eating arsenic cookies and drinking each other’s blood, you know, not healthy.  These kids needed sun.  They looked like cave dwellers.  And again, I’m not saying all republicans are cave dwellers.  But I am saying, if you’re a cave dweller, you’re gonna be a republican.  And that is cool, they need representation too.  But you know, kinda like how we give D.C. representation.  A seat at the table, but they don’t get a gavel.  Like the Secretary of Veteran Affairs.  You know.  Eric Shinseki? 

Look, Im not saying its anything other than a coicidence, but this guy is born in Hawaii just like Obama. But I want you to ask yourself, honestly, do you put it past Hawaii to try and infiltrate our government? I mean they had to have seen what Alaska did. And sure, she lost, but perhaps that was just too close for comfort. Now they have started making a play to get their share when we go into liquidation. You know you're doomed as a nation when the parts of you that arent attached to you are fighting over your carcass. Seriously, the body isnt even cold yet and they already installing a wave pool in the Rose Garden.

Exactly my point.  You don’t even know who hell he is.  Even though he’s the most awesome cabinet pick of them all, I mean he got his foot maimed from his time in ‘nam.  Which is more than I will ever give for this country.  Not that a maimed foot should get you ahead of the line, but I think if it’s your turn and you’ve got a maimed foot, you can always just play that foot card at board meetings.  Oh yeah, I gave a foot for this place, what have you given Frank?  What, 2 years in the reserves, oh poor Frank, I hope you didn’t have to miss SNL for the one weekend a year you were gone.  And I don’t mean to belittle his stature.  I mean, I know just being in the cabinet is a big deal, you *do* get to talk to the president a lot, that’s cool.  And it’s not like Shinseki is looking to take a lot of responsibility, I mean he has been in the army for like 38 years.  But still, this guy is so awesome.  He was the *only* son of a bitch who stood up to Rumsfield on record and said it was going to take several hundred thousand troops to secure Iraq and he was vilified and beaten back by Rummy and Wolfowitz and was thrown to the wolves at Fox and the right wing hate machine and they tore this guy up and knocked everything he ever did and mocked and ridiculed him until finally, three months into the occupation he retired because he had to get away from the crazys.  So that fact that he, Eric Shinseki, gets to sit in the fucking cabinet and talk to Obama.  That is pretty sweet.  I am happy for that dude.  And who doesn’t think Obama isn’t going to throw the Veterans a bunch of love.  I mean if Obama ends the Drug War there will be a lot, tons, of extra money swilling around the till.  So yeah, Eric Shinseki, that man should be making decisions.  To think that is how our president is choosing cabinet members instead of just giving them to his friends is just so lovely.  Thank god the insanity is over.  Let it never happen again.  Ever.

Anyway, the point is if you needed to make some more tea baggers the formula is quite simple:   crazy+ flowers in the attic= sean hannity or, if you are south of the equator, dracula.  Remeber, their summer is your winter.

Anyway, the real point was the concert.  And can I just say, oh my god, going to concerts in the lou is a treat.  Clean bathrooms, no lines, nice staff, easy access, great views, great air conditioning, cocktail service, always toilet paper and hand towels.  Well I will admit sometimes the Pageant runs out, but really that’s why god invented cocktail napkins.  I mean sure, one is pretty inadequate, but a stack of like 20 will hold a cup of water.  No, it’s not a sham wow, but wtf, I never said I was McGuyver.  The point is we got their late, got a drink right away and got to within 4 places of the stage all before the most boring band in the world came out, the courteens, who opened, but more about that later.

Anyway, the first thing I would say about this particular Morrissey concert, as opposed to his last concert in St. Louis 2 years ago, was that 2 years ago it was packed, and this time, I was offered $10 tickets before I got to the door.  And they weren’t scammers.  These were 2 really cold emo kids who clearly had a situation where one of the boys had bought 3 tickets on his card and then was expecting to get his friends to cover the other tickets and one of the friends either a) flaked out, b) had some life changing event, i.e., new baby, lost job, family wedding, term paper due or c) chicks just don’t like you that much that you couldn’t find anyone in your address book to give that ticket to.  I mean excuse me for a moment here, because this is important.  I feel I need to just spill just a few words of wisdom from a man who once was a boy with a lot of spare tickets to concert events.   Seriously why would you sell a ticket for $10?  At that price you are getting one round at the bar.  And who are you going to get drunk with that?  Your other dude friend?  See the golden opportunity.  A girl who wouldn’t sniff in your direction, may be tempted by the concert to give fate a chance and say yes.  Especially if she is a big Morrissey fan.  Or recently had a natter with her girlfriend about how she doesn’t do anything anymore and now that she is out of college a few years she feels stagnant.  And really, what girl hasn’t had a brief flirtation with the Smiths at some point in their lives?  So go for broke my friends.  Time is running out.  And that is a great first date because it is low commitment, the music will make long awkward pauses obsolete.  And you can show off your manly skills by fetching her drinks, getting her a good spot on the floor, moving your body to protect your girl from the drunk asshole who is dancing waay too excitedly for a straight man at a Morrissey show, giving her your jacket when she is cold on the walk back to the car, offering her a copy of your favorite Morrissey album, Vauxhall and I obviously, because you don’t want to give off to much of your creepy guy love for Morrissey with his shirt off on Your Arsenal.  But you know, the point is get desperate emo kids.  Just buck up and grow a pair and start asking girls to things.  Don’t offer to sell your tickets for $10 to me, the dude who already is going on a $20 ticket because the scalping agency just couldn’t sell them.  So yeah, when the scalpers are taking a hit on a show, its time to start making new friends.  Morrissey would approve.  He actual does have sex you know.  With men.  He just says he doesn’t because it’s a funny joke.  So if he approves, you should just do it.

So we get to the door and they are screaming, why? Fuck knows, I guess cause we ignore them so they feel like they can.  Anyway, no cameras or recorders.  That is what their screaming.  Which made me feel good.  Cause I was hoping to bring my pocket camcorder and take footage. Because nothing is funner than video.  But when I saw the ticket say no camera I thought better of it and clearly realized I was a little too stoned if my ticket was now talking to me.  Story of my life.  Always a little too stoned.  Like Goldilocks, I can never get it quite right.  Anyway, no cameras.  No video.  There must have been a meeting about it because all the staffers were on the same page.  Which clearly was all well and good for the jackasses outside doing “crowd control” (of what, the throngs of 12?) but for the poor ladies checking bags it was their worst nightmare.  Because everything is a fucking camera these days.  Phones, Ipods, keychains, nail files.  I mean who is really going to enforce no cell phones?  Which is what I realized when I was searched, because the poor lady feels my right pocket, then the left, the goes back to the right, and starts making out the outline in the fabric.  I’m like, it’s just my blackberry, to which she lifts her eyes off my package area, and with these really beat down eyes just says, please don’t take pictures.  I felt so sorry immediately for her. I was like, okay.  Which was of course a total lie.  But I told her I would behave anyway.  What a horrible job.

Anyway, the fact is, she, and Morrissey as well, have nothing to be afraid of with either my or my companion’s cell phones.  Mine are a little bigger, but what I thought was a photo showing just how close we were actually looks like a ball of pure energy at 100 yards.  But suffice to say, we were super close, like 4 people back.  I could not only see the spit fly out of his mouth when he said kick, but also where that spit landed on stage.  It was perfect.  And we got there at 7:50, just in time for the most boring band ever, the Courteens, which I will get to in a sec, but first this is what my phone produced of the show:

So really, I have knackered myself out and I haven’t gotten to the review yet, or even what this concert has taught me about life in the bigger picture.  But I realized something just now.  This is not a novel.  Its a blog.  So you know what.  I’m stopping here.  I’ll start up again tomorrow.  But I think I’ve written myself out for the day.  Hey, you’re not happy about no review, I’m not happy about the fact that I already have like 5 stories backed up waiting to be written, its not an ideal situation, but screaming at me isn’t going to make the review be written any faster.  I’ll get to it tomorrow.  Promise.