24 November 1997
Kleinhan's Music Hall, Buffalo, NY

Do Your Best And Don't Worry
The Boy Racer
Billy Budd
Satan Rejected My Soul
London
Hold On To Your Friends
Reader Meet Author
Trouble Loves Me
Why Don't You Find Out For Yourself
Roy's Keen
Spring-Heeled Jim
Ambitious Outsiders
Speedway
/Shoplifters Of The World Unite
Morrissey started the show in good spirits, but he came down gradually because the audience wasn't very enthusiastic. Only a few fans made it on stage throughout the evening. The setlist was slightly resequenced and "Now My Heart Is Full" was replaced by "Speedway".

As he took the stage, Morrissey tossed an orange into the crowd, took the microphone and greeted the audience with "Good evening Paris... Buffalo!". In set opener "Do Your Best And Don't Worry", he changed a line to "This is you in a drab black". This was probably by distraction because he mumbled the next line, as if in confusion. After "Billy Budd" he had a rant against the local press: "I must say that your local paper - the Buffalo Pest - said that tonight would be a depressing evening... they may be depressed, but I'm not!" During "London"'s instrumental outro he crouched and held the microphone hanging upside down from its cord.

Following "Reader Meet Author", someone threw a towel on stage with the words "I'm Karen" on it. After picking it up, Morrissey asked "Is this a cry for help? Where's Karen? Karen?" and threw the towel back into the audience. In "Why Don't You Find Out For Yourself", he changed a line, perhaps distractedly, to "Then you'll see the grass hidden in the glass". After the song he had another word with the audience. It is unclear however if the question was addressed to the general population of Buffalo or to the fans following Morrissey on tour: "So when will you leave Buffalo? When will you go to New York? Isn't that what everybody does? Yeah?".

In "Roy's Keen" Morrissey changed a few words, perhaps to fit the general ambiance of the evening "He's romancing you and chancing his arm, he'll be here frowning on time / he's romancing you and chancing his arm, he'll be here frowning on time". When he returned to the stage after a short break he said "thanks for a very somber evening" before going into encore "Shoplifters Of The World Unite".

 


The complete concert was filmed from the center balcony. The clear and steady footage features nice close-ups and is circulated on bootleg DVDs. A rather good audience recording of the full set is circulated on bootleg cds and on the internet. This is not the audio track from the video recording.

 

Do you have information about this concert? Or do you own an uncirculated recording of it? If yes please contribute and get credited.

 

Quotes

Morrissey, on stage on 25 August 2006 in Paris: "Some years ago we played a place in the Dis-United States called Buffalo, which is - as I'm sure you do not know - is Upstate New York, Cleveland, Rochester, ta-ta-ta, it's almost Canada, but Canada didn't want it so it stayed a part of the USA (...) And when we were in Buffalo I walked on stage and I said 'Hello Paris!' (crowd laughs) which I thought was funny. But the next day in the press in (mocking voice) Buffalo, they all said Morrissey could not even remember where he was, so I think irony is never a safe bet in Buffalo..."