Two big pop events took place on Saturday. In Manchester, there was the Brit Awards. One by one the bourgeois brats who swell the ranks of popular culture blubbed like babies over the rise of Reform. ‘I’m genuinely terrified’, said someone called Self Esteem. Britain is becoming a ‘fascist state’, wailed Irish singer CMAT. ‘The rise of Reform is a really bad thing’, said the fella who plays bass in indie band Wolf Alice.

Saturday’s gig at the O2 felt like the revenge of Morrissey. It was one in the eye for cancel culture

Saturday’s gig at the O2 felt like the revenge of Morrissey. It was one in the eye for cancel culture

Then there was the Morrissey show at The O2 in London. As those sons and daughters of privilege opined the rise of populism while picking up their golden gongs in Manchester, Manchester’s most sullen son was enthralling a crowd of 20,000 down south. He defended the waving of the British flag. He had a pop at cancel culture. He derided the ‘jealous bitches’ of the cultural elite who lust after the scalp of any mortal who dares to disagree with them.

What an extraordinary spectacle: the fresh-faced pop kids of the new millennium dutifully spouting every establishment talking point while a 66-year-old bruiser from the Eighties sounded a stirring note of dissent. As those indie........

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