This article was automatically translated by AI.
First, let's talk about the album "Vauxhall And I", which seamlessly follows MORRISSEY's third solo album "Your Arsenal". Starting with "Now My Heart Is Full", through "Spring-Heeled Jim" to the third song "Billy Budd", MORRISSEY builds the dynamics from one song to the next. With the fourth song "Hold On Your Friends", the Mozzer, as MORRISSEY is also called by fans, completely drains the energy from the song and unfortunately does not regain it in the 7 subsequent songs. With a lot of melancholy, sorrow, and gloom, MORRISSEY mourns from song to song. Sorry dear MORRISSEY fans, but from the fourth song on, it’s just a homogeneous mix, same beats, same dejection; the 8 songs could have been recorded one after the other with a single melody, it wouldn’t have made a difference. I’m probably alone in my opinion, as "Vauxhall And I" was MORRISSEY's first and only album that reached number 1 in the UK charts. That was in March 1994, right after its release, and the three singles from the album also reached up to 8th place in the UK charts.
However, I slowly start to feel boredom with the 5th, 6th, and 7th songs. The oppressive songs sound so similar that I lose the desire to translate the lyrics. Unfortunately, the double album does not come with a booklet or lyric sheet, and while I was tempted to translate the lyrics of the first songs to the best of my knowledge and belief, I lose interest halfway through the nearly 40-minute album.
The live recording shows that it can be better. By the way, 5 of the 14 songs you hear are from the "Vauxhall And I" album. In addition to the already mentioned first three songs, there are "Why Don’t You Find Out For Yourself" and "The More You Ignore Me, The Closer I Get". The Mozzer doesn’t really go for short song titles ;-) In any case, on the second CD, during the 52 minutes of playtime, you can hear a significantly higher level of activity and pronounced joy of playing from the band. The live recording is truly great and reflects MORRISSEY's musical work from 1990-95 very well, earning it 8 out of 10 possible points. "Vauxhall And I" cannot keep up in this subjective view and has to settle for 3 points. This makes an average of 5.5 points, minus one point for the missing special package (booklet & co.), resulting in 4.5 points, which we’ll round up....
