While I know and appreciate that Morrissey has made some great solo records, I remain much more a fan of The Smiths than of the Mozzer himself. That said, I'm still going to see old Stevie tonight when he returns to The Rave.

It'll be the first time we've been in the same room since the one time I saw The Smiths, at The Aragon in Chicago in 1985. The following August, The Smiths -- by then a quintet -- played at the Performing Arts Center (now The Marcus Center for the performing Arts) and everyone in Milwaukee was there.

Everyone, that is, except me. That's because I was helping out some friends visiting from Scotland, for whom I'd booked a gig at The Underground - which was, by then, above ground -- with Die Kreuzen. The double bill was hardly a musical match made in heaven, but the schedule was what it was and club owner Tony Selig and the good guys in D.K. were gracious enough to accommodate us, and the gig went pretty well.

Of course, I don't regret missing The Smiths because a direct result of that weekend has been a friendship that has endured decades and thousands of miles.

But I have always been curious about the show, because I wasn't there.

Last week, a friend of mine took me as his guest to the Marcus Center to see Chazz Palminteri perform "A Bronx Tale," with the tickets he got for his birthday, and conversation turned to The Smiths gig in that room.

He recalled how a band member got him and another friend of ours into the show and was friendly and chatty. Little did they know at the time that it was this very band member's struggles with substance abuse that would help bring the Manchester band to its demise.

After the show, my friend recalled, the scene outside the backstage door on State Street was "pure Beatlemania," complete with screaming fans and the band running -- literally -- for the idling tour bus.

Morrissey's allure to his fans has only grown over the intervening 23 years -- although the Mozzer has since returned three times for gigs at the Riverside in 1992 on 2007 and in the Eagles Ballroom in 2004 -- so unless those fans have aged too much to run and scream, I suspect Mozz will have to make haste to the coach once again after tonight's show or risk losing his shirt (assuming he replaces the one he's almost certain to tear off himself onstage) to rabid devotees.