Jon Stewart, host of Comedy Central's 'The Daily Show', made reference to ol' Mozzer during Tuesday night's episode, March 30. He was commentating nonsensically on some footage from Monday night's NCAA Basketball Championship Game and said something like, "We here at The Daily Show would like to say more about the game, but most of us spent our teenage years playing Dungeons & Dragons and trying to get our hair to look like Morrissey's." At which point, a head shot of Morrissey appeared in the upper left of the television screen. The shot is one I've seen before, and I have a copy of it in the liner notes to a so-so bootleg called 'Rusholme Ruffians Play at Home', recorded in Manchester, 31 March 1985. That's a bit eerie about the date, no?

Unfortunately, there is an article in the April first edition of USA Today, the American daily newspaper, called "Big Business May Mean Discord For Small Bands," about the upcoming merger of Seagram-owned Universal Music with Polygram Entertainment. Among the acts rumored to be cut from the rosters include Primus, Sonic Youth, and, more irritatingly, Mr. Moz himself. They even have a picture of him alongside other "artists" like Paula Abdul and Lionel Richie.

On March 31st, 1999; Mikel Erentxun, ex-member of the Spanish group Duncan Dhu, played in Anaheim, CA at the JC Fandango night club. Mikel is a well known Spanish Rock artist who has been making great music since the early 1980's. After leaving the group Duncan Dhu, Mikel embarked a solo career and since then has recorded three albums. His first solo album was released back in 1994. In it to the surprise of many people he recorded the Spanish version of "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out" or "Esta Luz Nunca Se Apagara".

However, it wasn't until couple of years later after its release that the famous Spanish Rock radio station 97.5 (La super estrella) here in California began to play the song. At the same time many Spanish Rock night clubs began to play the song as part of their club mixes. Well a correlation that I must point out here is that in recent years we have since an increase of Morrissey fans in the Spanish speaking community (I don't want to use the words Latino/a or Hispanic so broadly). So we see that Mikel began to be adored by many Morrissey fans to the extent that many referred to him as the Spanish Morrissey. It was obvious that Mikel was a big Morrissey fan, but it became more evident when he released his third solo album at the end of 1998 where he recorded the Spanish version to "Everyday Is Like Sunday" or "Todo Es Igual Siempre (Everyday is like Sunday)"…

Now going back to the night of March 31st. For those who are into Spanish Rock, the opening band was called Volumen Cero. Mikel came out at about 11:00 pm and began to sing a couple of songs from his latest album. His third number was an old famous song by his group Duncan Dhu, "A Tientas De Ti". The next song and to my surprise was "Todo Es Igual Siempre (Everyday is like Sunday)". It was obvious by the loud screams that there were many Morrissey fans present in the concert. You could hear people loudly singing along with Mikel and specially during the chorus the singing became louder.

People were swaying from side to side as if they were thanking Mikel for singing that song. However, no one made an attempt to scream Morrissey's name, well that came later. The concert went on with Mikel singing more songs from the new album and more of his early songs, such as "A Un Minuto Be Ti".

The concert went on for about an hour and it seemed obvious that Mikel was ready to sing the last song for the night. Well as that old saying goes, he saved the best for last. Moving away from his usual introduction of his songs, playing the guitar while singing and remaining close to the microphone, Mikel seemed to prepare himself for something special. Well he was, because as soon as the first notes of "Esta Luz Nunca Se Apagara", he grabbed the microphone on one hand and began to move abruptly from side to side. The public became highly excited. They began to jump to all sides. The screams we extremely loud and seemed to make Mikel get into the song even more. After the first verse, it was evident that Mikel was willing to accept the demand of the public and began to rip his shirt open. The intensity of the public was reaching a higher level and for the remaining of the song they gave themselves to believe that it was Morrissey on stage. Mikel himself seemed to be very excited to the point that he ripped his shirt apart and let it fall to the ground. It seemed that everybody knew the lyrics and gladly sang it along. The song came to an end but not before Mikel had the public chant 'Esta luz nunca se apagara' for about 15 times. To my surprise there were some who were screaming 'There is a light that never goes out" and even other chanted Viva Morrissey… Mikel came back for an encore but he had exhausted his public and ended the concert with another old song by Duncan Dhu, "En Algun Lugar"…

The NME website has a brief item about the new Electronic album 'Twisted Tenderness', with tracklistings and dates for playbacks in the UK as well as a link to the new official website www.electronic-net.com, which features news, images, and RealAudio samples.

It's THE NGUYENS. All Smiths tunes, always...

See the Nguyens perform "Frankly Mr. Shankly!"
Or request your favorites. See if we can be stumped!
(Also The New Lows and The Amazing Barrassonics)

This Saturday, April 3rd, 10 p.m.
At the EL RIO
3158 Mission Street (Precita near Cesar Chavez, aka Army Street)
$5.00 Admission