ABSTRACT
Sting, Paul Simon, Peter Gabriel, David Byrne, Bruce Springsteen, all famously liberal pop stars, never performed at the Apollo in Harlem, yet that’s where Morrissey chose to launch a concert series to promote his album You Are The Quarry. Another perversely provocative move from the British singer, his five-night Apollo stint last May obtruded upon the legacy of James Brown and Motown, complicating our narrow view of pop music. This was, in fact, the ungentrification of popular culture. And that’s been Morrissey’s method ever since his 1980s group The Smiths reinvigorated British pop in the aftermath of the Punk movement.
