Next Batch Of Catalogue Reissues In June

Van Morrison Catalogue Reissues: 2008 Through 2009:
London 27 Nov 2007 - Van Morrison and Exile Productions in association with Polydor/Universal are pleased to announce the worldwide release of the Van Morrison back catalogue commencing January 2008.

This worldwide exclusive release covers 29 albums from 1971’s Tupelo Honey through to 2002’s Down The Road and includes the 1997 Two CD collection The Story of Them. The albums are being remastered and will include bonus material, none of which has been previously available.

Each album will include original artwork and full lyrics to Van Morrison compositions. The first series of 7 albums will be released on January 28th followed by a further 3 sets, all retailing at mid-price.

**********************Update***********************

The second series will be released on 30-Jun-08 & features:

A Night In San Francisco, 1994 - Cleaning Windows (Previously Unreleased)

Common One, 1980 - Haunts Of Ancient Peace (alternative take) & When Heart Is Open (alternative take)

Enlightenment, 1990 - Enlightenment (alternative take) & So Quiet In Here (alternative take)

Inarticulate Speech Of The Heart, 1983 - Cry For Home (alternative take) & Inarticulate Speech Of The Heart No.2 (alternative take)

Live At The Grand Opera House, 1984

No Guru, No Method, No Teacher, 1986 - Oh The Warm Feeling (alternative take) & Lonely At the Top (Previously Unreleased)

The Healing Game, 1997 - At The End Of The Day (Previously Unreleased)

Veedon Fleece, 1974 - Twilight Zone (alternative take) & Cul De Sac (alternative take)

The first series features:

Tupelo Honey, 1971 – Wild Night (alternative take) and a reworking of the traditional Down By The Riverside

It’s Too Late To Stop Now, 1974 - a live take on Brown Eyed Girl

Wavelength, 1978 – Kingdom Hall and Wavelength (Live at the Roxy Theatre, LA, Nov 26, 1978)

Into The Music, 1979 – Steppin’ Out Queen and Troubadours (alternative takes)

A Sense Of Wonder, 1984 – Crazy Jane On God and A Sense Of Wonder (alternative takes)

Avalon Sunset, 1989 – Whenever God Shines His Light (alternative take) and When The Saints Go Marching In (with additional lyrics by Van Morrison)

Back On Top, 1999 – Philosopher’s Stone (alternative take) and Valley Of Tears (A completely new arrangement of the Fats Domino Song)

The bonus recordings are of particular interest, the first time Van Morrison has authorised any unreleased material since The Philosopher’s Stone in 1998. Each reissued album includes exclusive unreleased recordings from each respective time period, giving a unique insight into some of his most revered songs.

10-May-08 Berlin Concert Review

Once again, here is Petra's review:
Good news for those of us who thought these times were gone gone gone – The Man’s definitely still got it ! If you believed all of his concerts these days are nothing but routine and on autopilot you get days like this – Van transcending into a special mood and singing as if there was no audience at all. And you almost feel ashamed for listening to what seems to be a very private performance …

Saturday’s set list was similar, but we got no ‘Healing’ …

Instead he played ‘All Work And No Play’ and seemed to enjoy himself a lot. He had to stop the alternate singing part in the end because he was laughing so much – making us smile.

‘Afternoon’ was again stunning on Saturday. This time it was almost the transfigured Van of the early years. When coming into the ‘Raincheck’ part he lingered on the words over and over. He repeated for a long time, it seemed, the words “keep on rockin’”, “like a ballerina”, “stepping’, steppin’” and again “keep on rockin’”. And then, harp still on his lips, he’s breathing and singing thru the harp – making an eerie sound and leaving us all in awe and wonder … It gave me a shiver from the neck down to the spine to witness this performance, taking us way way back …

But reality came back with ‘Precious Time’. A great ‘Help Me’ with fine solos of the band and Van playing harp again, followed by ‘Ritual’ closed another marvellous night in Berlin.

Setlist:
1. This Love Of Mine
2. Magic Time
3. Have I Told You Lately
4. Keep It Simple
5. That’s Entrainment
6. Bright Side Of The Road
7. Song Of Home
8. School Of Hard Knocks
9. Moondance
10. St. James Infirmary
11. All Work And No Play
12. End Of The Land
13. Lover Come Back
14. In The Afternoon > Ancient Highway > Raincheck > So Quiet In Here
15. Precious Time
16. I Can’t Stop Loving You
17. Star Of The County Down
18. Help Me
19. Behind The Ritual

Big Hand For The Band!
Sarah Jory, steel guitar
John Platania, guitar
Paul Moore, bass
Paul Moran, keyboards + trumpet
Tony Fitzgibbon, fiddle
Bobby Ruggiero, percussions
Neil Wilkinson, drums
Mick Green, guitar
Patti Revell, Karen Hamill + Vanessa Haynes, background vocals

[Image via Der Tagesspiegel]

09-May-08 Berlin Concert Review

There is a review of this concert, in German, at Der Tagesspiege.

Petra sends this review:
The two shows at the circus-tent-like Tempodrom in Berlin on Friday and Saturday were not sold out entirely. But the craig was good, Van and his band in superb shape and the audience – many of them young people – enjoyed it.

Support act was Shirley Grimes again – maybe Van could change that for the next German concerts ? Annoying as well was the fact that on both evenings many people arrived late, long after Van had begun to sing. Looking for their seats in the dark is definitely distracting the people being on time from concentrating on the music …

Van kept it simple again, this time not the entire new album as in Cologne and Frankfurt. Just 5 songs on Friday and 7 on Saturday. When announcing these he muttered:
“Keep it simple – I really wish it was …”

First half of the show was more or less routine, nothing new on the set list, and I thought by myself: It’s becoming a bit boring – the same songs again and again … Van played a lot of sax in Berlin + a bit of ukulele, harp, guitar and piano. It was great pleasure again to witness how the band enjoyed playing together. They laid down a number of beautiful solos. Poor Paul Moran had a lot to do with playing both keyboard and trumpet. Sarah Jory on the steel guitar got much applause for her passionate playing – the crowd loved it a lot.

‘Moondance’ seems to be the favorite crowd pleaser these days - no more Glorias and BEG’s ! In particular the young people in Germany obviously love that song. Interesting – but I must admit that it was again a flawless and superb jazzy performance of that old standard. Stunning solos of the band, light reflexions of a starry sky on the dark stage background – really beautiful. It’s just that we heard this song so often …

The titles were taken at a pretty fast pace, no breaks, one well-knowned tune following the other, but the best was yet to come:

‘In The Afternoon’ leading into a few other tunes making Van mumble “… meanwhile, back in the jungle”. And he continued with a few lines of ‘Ancient Highway’, fading out and repeating over and over the words “…don’t you get me high”, leading into ‘Raincheck’ with name checks of a few other songs including a few lines of ‘So Quiet In Here’. Van’s soft singing in the end was accompanied by and interwoven with Paul’s gently playing a muted trumpet before the song finally faded out. What a wonderful moment !! There was such a subtlety of tone and gentless in playing that the audience held its breath – a pin could have been heard dropping. But then the crowd started its applause, shouted, whistled – and the magic was gone. Who knows - maybe he would have continued for a while if the crowd had remained silent ???

It went on with a cheerful ‘Star Of The County Down’ with Van showing us directions. Followed by a nice ‘Behind The Ritual’ leaving the audience in disbelief when Van was walking off the stage, still singing.

But surprise - he came back to give us the second highlight of the night – ‘Healing Has Begun’. Great version including window sill stuff and lots of backstreet jelly roll, but leaving out most of the spoken part.
All in all it was a superb concert on Friday and everybody was happy. The young and new fans for all they got, the older ones for some very special moments we shared.

Van was in great shape and mood but not very talkative. Yes, we realized – he was saying politely ‘dankeschoen’ twice !! He seemed to be quite fit again, sometimes almost jumping (!) a bit during singing. No more chairs on stage for him to sit down …


Setlist:
This Love of Mine
Magic Time
Have I Told You Lately
Playhouse
Keep It Simple
That's Entrainment
Lover Come Back
End Of the Land
Bright Side Of the Road
Moondance
Stranded
Presious Time
I Can't Stop Lovin' You
In the Afternoon
Help Me
St James Infirmary
Star Of the County Down
Behind the Ritual
And the Healing Has Begun

Big Hand For The Band!
Sarah Jory, steel guitar
John Platania, guitar
Paul Moore, bass
Paul Moran, keyboards + trumpet
Tony Fitzgibbon, fiddle
Bobby Ruggiero, percussions
Neil Wilkinson, drums
Mick Green, guitar
Patti Revell, Karen Hamill + Vanessa Haynes, background vocals

Thanks to Per H for setlist.
Thanks to Ron for photos.

30-Apr-08 Cheltenham Concert Review

Nosey checks in with this review:
Wonderful Van gig last night at Cheltenham, he'd just finished on a high with Behind the ritual and then into a great Healing Has Begun, walking off and returning (for the second time, I recall) to send us all home with a quite good version of Gloria. The band were happy and as relaxed as I'd ever seen 'em, in fact during one "solo" the keyboard player actually stopped playing and looked at Van jokingly then carried on playing. Sara Jory was as bubbly as she's ever been and the Cheltenham crowd warmed to her straight away.

Still no Crawford Bell or Mick Green, but we did get a namecheck during Moondance for the 3 backup singers, Patti Revell, Karen Hammil and I'm sure Bobby said Vanessa Mayes (please excuse the spelling ladies), but that could be clarified later.

I can honestly say that last nights band are just as tight as any Johnny Scott band (if not better), Okay I realise that there are many factors to take into consideration, setlists, different instruments, arrangements, all sorts of things.

BUT, last nights band were (are) Good, in fact they've gelled into a VERY Good band indeed. They've got confidence, and all are really enjoying the moment, you can see it in their faces, the way the look at each other during the songs and they support each other after the little solos they get. They even comment to each other during the show, which usually brings a smile from the recipient. To me, this is wonderful to see, they're happy to be there and it shows in their demeanour and performance.

I noticed a couple of things last night, one of the new backup singers Vanessa Mayes (?) has a really powerful voice, she gets to "screech" (wrong word, but nevermind) during Gloria, just like the backup singer does in that song by Pink Floyd, and trust me, you can hear her over the band when Van's left the stage and they crank it up, shes a great addition.

Last night Van spoke, something to the effect of "This is where I get to
hide behind my guitar", apparently he was joking, but as nobody laughed, he
repeated it, still no laughter. Now, that WAS funny. He also picked up the ukelele and said, "This part is George Formby's greatest Hits" (or as near as dammit), that DID get a laugh.

Setlist:
This Love Of Mine
Magic Time
Have I Told You Lately [Las Vegas version]
Keep It Simple
That's Entrainment
Bright Side Of The Road
Song Of Home
Lover Come Back
Moondance
I Can't Stop Loving You
Precious Time [scat ending]
Saint James Infirmary
Stranded
End Of The Land
Tupelo Honey >Why Must I Always Explain?
Help Me
Behind The Ritual
And The Healing Has Begun
Gloria

Big Hand For The Band!
Tony Fitzgibbon
Karen Hamill
Vanessa Haynes
Sarah Jory
Paul Moore
Paul Moran
John Platania
Patti Revell
Bobbie Ruggiero
Neal Wilkinson

[Image via Showbiz Ireland]