Filthy Boy’s lead singer Paraic Morrissey has got to be one of the scariest 19-year-olds I’ve ever seen, standing on stage with curled lip as he belts out lyrics about sado-masochism, rape and sex parties. With a voice that would sound threatening whatever it was saying, and an incredible talent for disturbing and haunting lyrics, he fronts Filthy Boy with a swagger which belies his young age. ‘Biggest Fan Ever’, the penultimate track on the band’s debut LP, is the story of a man who kidnaps another man with whom he is obsessed and plays out his sick fantasy of their marriage.
Right from the start, as Morrissey tells his imaginary victim “you ain’t goin’ nowhere/not ‘til you’ve been fed” in a laconic yet sinister drawl, a sense of discomfort is created which pervades the entire track. The chorus wades into Morrissey’s character’s sexual fantasies as he manages to inject even the most prosaic of lyrics with an undeniable threat, “I’ve just made the dinner/and you say it’s lovely” before becoming explicit, ordering his prisoner in no uncertain terms to “fuck me/you fuck me hard, hard in the arse like a superstar”. The song continues to build in distressing the listener, piling unease upon unease relentlessly until a climax is reached. The police find Morrissey’s character, and shoot him dead, only for the house in which they are hiding to burst into flames, “he’s taken them with him”. As Filthy Boy’s constructed world burns, Paraic’s brother Michael raises his lead guitar to a fever pitch and the song hits a crescendo as Paraic growls at the top of his voice “I’m your biggest fan ever/One day we will be together”.
This is definitely one for those who are tired of soppy love lyrics pervading everything they listen to, but it’s not one for those who don’t like walking down dark alleys alone at night. Especially when Paraic Morrissey is on the loose.
