'I'm Not Sorry'

Morrissey Slips Below The Waterline

The fifth track on 2004’s You Are The Quarry studio album, ‘I'm Not Sorry’ is credited as having been recorded in Los Angeles in 2004¹. Co-written with Boz Boorer, the personnel on the song were producer Jerry Finn, the aforementioned Boz Boorer (guitar), Alain Whyte (guitar), Gary Day (bass), Dean Butterworth (drums) and Roger Manning (piano). Flautist Rhys Williams plays flute on the track.²

Morrissey has performed the song live a total of 36 times to date, mostly on his You Are The Quarry Tour (2004). He performed the song a handful of times on his Low In High School Tour (2017 -2018).

While certainly one of Morrissey’s more somber tracks, ‘I'm Not Sorry’ contains an undercurrent of hard-earned self-assurance as it delicately traverses the line between resignation (“when will this tired heart stop beating?”) and resistance (“I’m not sorry for… the things I’ve done”). Morrissey’s vocals are measured, calm, and at times almost conversational, with little flourish. The listener is met with emotional fatigue tempered by clarity. Instead of coming across as bitter or overwrought, the vocals convey resolve and even acceptance.

Beleaguered by personal upheaval, the protagonist is wearied by competition and the emotional grind of existence - the proverbial ‘game’ that is life (“existence is only a game”) - so much so that he is “slipping below the water line”. Despite all of this, the protagonist confesses that he isn’t sorry for his actions or words, which belies a hardened acceptance of himself.

Themes of rejection and loneliness surface in the protagonist’s confession that the ideal partner never materialized — in fact, “the woman of my dreams” may never have existed at all. The repeated image of “slipping below the waterline” suggests melancholy, or perhaps withdrawal and alienation, with a final emotional plea for connection (“reach for my hand”).

The lyrics conclude with the line that "there's a wild man in my head", a metaphor for