Piccadilly Palare
"He's much better at this than belly dancing in the
desert covered in clay"
Piccadilly
Palare
At
AmberGet
Off The Stage
Released In October 1990
Yea-Sayers:
Firmly esconced in the ex-Madness camp, and I chose that
last word with careful deliberation, Morrissey improves on his previous
outing with this tribute to gullible boys everywhere. A self-appointed
Fair Rent Officer, we find him wracked, rolled and howling of the disappointments
that lead to that HQ of Male Meat Marketing, Piccadilly Circus.
Under the provocative pose of Eros, Moz reckons his narrator was "On
the rack I was, easy meat, and a reasonable good buy" and he
should know. The blushy double-jointed dandy flirts with under-age prostitution,
more interested in the social despair than the everyday details. He's
much better at this than belly dancing in the desert covered in clay.
It's time to realise that he'll never repeat his work with The Smiths,
and if he's going to establish another writing relationship then it's
going to be down to trial and error.
With Suggs on guest spoken vocals, production credits to Langer &
Winstanley, and Bedders in the studio, Moz has at least found true cellmates
in Madness, the stomping harpsichord beat bearing out the influence. It's
amazing what a slap across the wrist can do for the creative juices.
- James Brown, NME, 10/13/90 |
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"It's not a particularly strong record.
It's not overwhelming, the subject is even slightly dated. 'Piccadilly
Palare', which will receive blanket horrendous reviews, is a song about
male prostitution. But I'm not running around in the street saying 'Look
at me singing about male prostitution, isn't that incredibly unique!'
I don't want plaudits for examining a new subject, but I will say that
even coming across a pop record with a reasonably unique situation is
in itself interesting."
-Morrissey, Vox, November 1990
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"'Palare' is gypsy slang that was adopted by the
theatre and in the Seventies I heard it being used by male prostitutes
(laughs). They have their own code words for sizing people up
and talking among themselves. The song is about male prostitution in Piccadilly.
It became a very big thing during the Seventies. Were you ever aware of
documentaries like Johnny Go Home? In the North, among most people I know,
there was something oddly romantic about the whole thing. It spelt 'freedom'.
Catching a coach and spending a day in Piccadilly was extraordinary. It's
very glitzy now because Soho's been cleaned up, but then it was quite...
powerful."
- Morrissey, The Face, March 1990
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There's a song on this album that has the Rolling Stones
in mind because I've been so disgusted by their most recent comeback that
I no longer find it sad or pitiful, I just feel immense anger that they
don't just get out of the way. You open papers in this country,
and every day there's the obligatory picture of, y'know, Mick-with-bags-at-the-airport,
or Keith saying he's completely normal now. They just won't move away!
The song is called 'Get Off The Stage'."
- Morrissey, The Face, March, 1990
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