Keep It Simple Poll Results
Final voting is done for your favorite tunes on Van' latest Keep It Simple.
Here are the final reults - thanks for participating:
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Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Sunday, July 20, 2008
19-Jul-08 Stockholm Concert Review
Aftonbladet:
(Translated via Google)
Van Morrison is never uninteresting
Best: "Behind the ritual."
Sämst: As usual, everything he does not play.
I have seen Van Morrison quite a few times in the last twenty years, but the question is if I have ever seen the man in better mood than in this evening.
The Belfast cowboy laughs and smiles several times, yodel (!), Jokes about Clint Eastwood and becomes even really filthy when he freestyle at its best in "In the afternoon".
In addition, he, total out of the blue, in a cover of Pink Floyd "Comfortably numb" middle of the set.
It is never uninteresting to see Van Morrison.
And it is also a long time ago it was pleasant. For he has a fun, highly alert ties with them, which become infected by the main character pepper, and we may be delicate versions of the classic "Vanlose stairway" and the new album's most powerful track, "Behind the ritual."
But the focus is almost entirely on material from the last 15 years, and even if neither the "Fire in the belly" or "Magic time" are weak songs include age not to Morrison's primary and the concert sprakar rarely really seriously.
Sin. The conditions were of course.
Just a few more of the man's many classics were probably enough to make this a great evening.
-Håkan Steen
SVD.se
(Translated via Google)
Van Morrison is Jazz Festival's major attraction and fills the plan in front of the Great scene with an eager and happy audience. The man is in a relatively good mood - which means that he yodel and escape the hint of laughter - but, as usual, plays a type of music that is designed for small venue, not a jazz festival.
Van Morrison played ninety minutes, no encore. Dressed in cap and gray suit over a black t-shirt.
The first half hour is solely hubby cozy feel good-jazz of the anonymous nature. The remaining time devoted more attention to the Celtic soul he is associated. The set includes Pink Floyd Comfortably numb and as the last song he throws in Gloria.
Nice band - sometimes to an organic groove that feels a bit more engaging, especially in a long, hypnotic Mystic church. The songs garnished with short solos: Van Morrison himself is quite diligent in altsax, which is the fun - and perhaps provocative for some jazz - when he was still after all these years is an amateur, with a svajig and weak tonbildning.
It is not a bad concert, but a lot goes on routine and as I said was, Skeppsholmen is not the right forum for the introverted man with the soulful voice.
-Dan Backman
UNT.se
Shortly after the clock eight is the time for tonight's principal, Van Morrison, to show what he is going for. A few songs into the concert, it is clear that not only are the old fans who love what they hear, but that he also made an additional hundreds of new fans. Opening This love of mine is followed directly by soulballaden Magic time, where his voice falls into perfect harmony with the kompe wind. Fame has been achieved over the blues form and with the added a nice shufflegung at All work and no play. On That's entrainment heard noises from Hawaii and the longer time required, the better mood, he seems to be on. As he switches instruments from the saxophone to the harmonica to the piano to the ukulele and so on, he offers even some laughter. To many people's surprise, and delight, is also a cover of Pink Floyd's classic Comfortably numb.
Because of Wasa Express ports, I so far to one side during Morrison's concert that the only thing I can see the main character is a neddragen hat sticks up behind a hammondorgel, but apart from the Van is still in every way "The Man".
-Douglas Norström
Joseph Cooper:
On the Saturday, despite forecasts of an impending monsoon, my wife Kristin our daughter Shona and I set off to Stockholm to meet up with Paul and on to see Van and Joan. Upon arriving in Stockholm it was apparent the weather forecasters had got it wrong, and it was a fantastic summer evening. Van was in great form and performed 90 minutes of a set that broadly spanned the last 20 years of his work. This of course is the joy and pain of being a Van Morrison fan that you want to hear all the best of the past 40 years and that is just not possible in 90 minutes. However, all in all a fine performance by “The Man” and my daughter Shona’s first concert at 22 months old. Shona totally enjoyed being on her father’s shoulders dancing as Van sang a wonderful reworking of “The Healing Has Begun”.
Another review, in Swedish, can be found at DN.se
Setlist:
This Love Of Mine
Magic Time
Fame
All Work No Play
St. James Infirmary
Keep It Simple
That's Entrainment
Vanlose Stairway
Fire In The Belly
In The Afternoon>Raincheck
Help Me
Comfortably Numb
Rough God Goes Riding
Behind The Ritual
Burning Ground
And The Healing Has Begun
Gloria
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
Katie Kissoon & Vanessa Haynes, background vocals
[Images via Anna]
Sunday, July 13, 2008
12-Jul-08 Atlantic City Concert Review
Dan's review:
Superb ending to the six night U.S./Toronto run. Van's voice strong, supple and supremely expressive. Plenty of zingers. During In the Afternoon, as Van took us down the Ancient Highway, we again arrived at "GnomeWorld," where the half- dozen "motherfucking" gnomes that were purchased were "so fucking heavy" when they were placed in the car trunk and driven home. "Nothing really happened, but you got six gnomes." Before Keep It Simple: "We're going do a selection of Tiny Tim's Greatest hits." Before Healing has Begun: "This is a simple tale of ordinary folk." Van dedicated Comfortably Numb to 2 Universal Music executives.
The Cypress Avenue flowed beautifully. It is still a work in progress, and this version ended a bit abruptly. But it was great to hear the song again live for the first time this century.
On the other hand, the Ballerina tonight reached to the stars. Sublime.
And the Healing was Begun was an absolutely joyful, ecstatic romp, Van roaming and roaming and roaming across the fields. "By George, you've got it," Van told the band.
It feels like a brand new day has dawned in this artist's astounding career.
Setlist:
Domino
Tupelo Honey>Why Must I Always Explain
Tore Down A La Rimbaud
Wavelength
Comfortably Numb
In the Afternoon>Let It Roll>Ancient Highway>Raincheck
Ballerina
Cypress Avenue
Moondance
Keep It Simple
That's Entrainment
Rough God
Burning Ground
Healing has Begun
Brown Eyed Girl
Gloria
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
Katie Kissoon & Vanessa Haynes, background vocals
11-Jul-08 Philadelphia Concert Review
Delaware On-Line:
Van Still the Man in Rousing Tower Concert
UPPER DARBY, Pa. -- Leaving his reputation as a grouch at the stage door, a playful Van Morrison closed out his two-night residency at the Tower Theater on Friday night, showering his fans with a generous night of hits, forgotten songs and hidden gems.
The 62-year-old Irishman, who returned to the Tower for the first time since 1978, is known for being stingy when it comes to performing his best known songs.
But on Friday, Morrison dug out a jazzy version of "Moondance" midway through the 100-minute show before closing out the night with a powerful one-two punch: an all-acoustic rendering of "Brown Eyed Girl" followed by 1964's "Gloria." "Tupelo Honey" was also included in the 17-song set.
In a blue suit and black fedora, Morrison mined his 40-plus-year career backed by a nine-piece band, himself jumping among guitar, saxophone, harmonica, piano and ukulele throughout the night.
In the evening's most unusual moment, he sang Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb," which he originally performed with Roger Waters in 1990 -- a song that re-emerged thanks to its inclusion in Martin Scorsese's "The Departed" and "The Sopranos." Even though Morrison forgot the name of the song, read the lyrics and missed two lines, it was spine-tingling to watch him bellow the song's chorus.
On "Ballerina" from his seminal "Astral Weeks" album, Morrison showed off his trademark soulful delivery, repeating words at a spitfire pace and stretching others like Silly Putty.
In a moment of improvisation, Morrison motioned for his piano player to move out of the way, nearly knocking him from his bench. Morrison leaned over the piano, played a bit with one hand while holding his guitar in the other as his devoted followers cheered.
Throughout, he smiled and joked with the audience and the band, even letting out a "Yip! Yip!" after singing, "Now they're moaning like a dog in a manger," during "Rough God Goes Riding."
The most gleeful moment for Morrison appeared to come during "That's Entrainment" from his new album "Keep It Simple," which entered the Billboard charts at No. 10 in April, the highest debut for any album of his career.
Morrison, shuffling from side to side and playing a ukulele, danced along as he seductively sang, "Want you to shake your money maker, want you to shake 'em on down!"
He would later improvise once again during the sexed-up "In The Afternoon," singing, "Don't you feel my leg/'Cause if you feel my leg/You'll wanna feel my thigh/If you feel my thigh/You'll want to move up high."
Morrison did not just sing his songs, he embodied them with his left hand tightly gripping the gold microphone stand while the other twitched with every word.
His blink-and-you-missed-it six-date North America tour ended Saturday night at the Borgata Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City.
And if you think the Tower Theater tickets ranging from $75 to $350 were costly, they were $125-$500 for the Atlantic City show. At $500 a ticket, that's about $5 a minute.
But on Friday, fans didn't have much to complain about. They got Van the Man on a good night. Given his limited touring schedule, especially in the United States, let's just hope it's not another 30 years before he returns.
-Ryan Cormier
Setlist:
1. Did you Get Healed
2. Tupelo Honey> Why must I always explain
3. Tore Down a la Rambaud
4. Wavelength
5. All in a game> You know what they are writing about> Make it real
6. Comfortably Numb
7. In the afternoon> Raincheck> Big Joe Turner
8. Ballerina
9. Sweet Thing
10. Moondance
11. Keep it simple
12. That's Entrainment
13. Rough God goes riding
14. Burning ground
15. And the healing has begun> Backstreet
16. Brown-eyed girl
17. Gloria
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
Katie Kissoon & Vanessa Haynes, background vocals
Friday, July 11, 2008
10-Jul-08 Philadelphia Concert Review
Philadelphia Inquirer:
A Satisfying Van Morrison at The Tower
"It's all one song!" Neil Young once famously said in response to a heckler who accused him of making music that all sounded alike. The same could be said of the songs of Van Morrison, the legendary Irish singer with a reputation as an uneven live performer, who played the Tower Theater on Thursday in the first of three area shows that will conclude his current six date North American tour.
Not that there's anything wrong with that. For over 40 years, the 62-year-old Morrison, who plays the Tower again tonight and the Borgata Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City on Saturday, has been blending American rhythm and blues, jazz and country into a Celtic soul stew that simmered satisfyingly for an hour and 40 minutes in Upper Darby on Thursday.
Wearing a buttoned-up suit jacket and a fedora that looked as if it had been pounded down with a mallet, Morrison came on stage blowing a harmonica on "Wild Night" at 7:36. (That was just six minutes after the show's scheduled start time. Stragglers, consider yourselves warned.) He commenced to lead the nine person ensemble he never introduced by name - it included singers Katie Kissoon and Vanessa Haynes, steel guitarist Sarah Jory and keyboard-trumpet player Paul Moran - into an efficient and proficient no-nonsense evening that featured a smattering of hits and a few left-field surprises.
The biggest instance of the latter was "Comfortably Numb," Morrison's version of the Pink Floyd song with turned up in The Departed and The Sopranos, and which was rendered in stately fashion with Morrison trading off vocals with Kissoon. Equally warmly received by a house packed mostly with Morrison's chronological contemporaries were "Tupelo Honey," and "Gloria," whose raucous spelling lesson brought the crowd to its feet for a thumping, if somewhat hurried, encore. (No luck on "Moondance," or "Domino," but there's always tonight, and tomorrow.)
Morrison enunciated poorly and emoted soulfully, played guitar and tooted on a saxophone. He shouted out the names of heroes such as Muddy Waters and Big Joe Turner as if they were holy men, and evoked 19th century French poet Arthur Rimbaud in asking his muse for inspiration in a spirited, brassy "Tore Down A La Rimbaud."
During "Ancient Highway," part of a medley that also included "In the Afternoon" and "Raincheck," he muttered something about a store on the side of the road "that sells garden gnomes." Other than that, and stopping to ask if anyone had heard his classic 1968 album Astral Weeks before a stirring "Madame George," he kept his inscrutable thoughts to himself and the music moving forward.
"Well it's out on the highway, and on with the show/Always telling people things they're too lazy to know," he sang grumpily early on, in "Why Must I Always Explain?" Morrison can often make it seem as if performing is a chore, a necessary evil to be endured to reach the sanctified place where blues and R & B and jazz and gospel and country come together, and words get in the way on the road to pure expression. At the Tower, he found that place, stayed a while, and then was gone.
-Dan DeLuca
Setlist:
Wild Night
Magic Time
Tupelo Honey > Why Must I Always Explain?
Little Village
Comfortably Numb
Wavelength
In the Afternoon
Tore Down a la Rimbaud
Ballerina
Keep It Simple
Thats Entrainment
Saint Dominic's Preview
Burning Ground
Behind The Ritual
Madame George
And the Healing Has Begun
Gloria
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
Katie Kissoon & Vanessa Haynes, background vocals
Thursday, July 10, 2008
09-Jul-08 Detroit Concert Review
Daily Tribune:
Van Morrison keeps it simple at the Fox
DETROIT -- Van Morrison doesn't make it easy to see him in concert.
Besides the fact he doesn't come around all that often -- although he's played Detroit two of the past three years after a 20-year gap -- the Irish rock icon's shows come with strictures fit for a Broadway production:
Showtime at 7:30 sharp with latecomers "accommodated at specific intervals." The usual prohibitions against cell phones or cameras, although in this case you get the sense Morrison himself will storm off the stage and smack you upside the head if they're violated. No smoking, even in the usual designated outside areas, and no alcohol served; you have to sing along to "Gloria" completely sober.
All that puts the onus on Morrison to deliver something special, and he did just that on Wednesday night at the Fox Theatre, with a playful and emotional performance that was so engaging the 90 minutes (Morrison's standard length, to the minute) seemed to breeze by.
Morrison is often a buyer-beware prospect, known for leaving the hits from his nearly 45-year recording career on the sidelines. On Tuesday, however, he came to please, kicking off with "Wild Night" and then rolling into "Tupelo Honey," which incorporated a bit of "Why Must I Always Explain?," and "Saint Dominic's Preview." A shimmering "Wavelength" and "Domino," that latter featuring Morrison on saxophone, also made appearances during the set.
There is a recent album, to promote, "Keep It Simple," and Morrison and his nine-member band offered up the title track, the energetic "That's Entertainment" -- during which multi-instrumentalist Sarah Jory "played" an intricate hand-clapping pattern -- and the rolling groove of "Behind the Ritual," all of which fit in nicely with his older material.
All of those would have been enough high points for any given show, but Morrison, singing in a brisk, lyric-swallowing cadence similar to Bob Dylan, had his eye on some proverbial higher ground. A rendition of Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb," showcasing backup singer Katie Kissoon, was as moving as it was surprising. A long meditation on "In the Afternoon," which allowed the band's soloists to pass the musical ball between them, referenced "Ancient Highway" and "Raincheck." Morrison vamped up a storm and even let loose with a curse during "The Burning Ground," hinting at some politically-based anger before grounding things with a sublime take on "And the Healing Has Begun."
And then there was "Gloria," which brought things to a close on a high note but also nodded to absent friends with a quick vocal lick from the late Bo Diddley's "Who Do You Love?" Diddley, of course, was one of rock's master showmen, and on this night at the Fox Morrison carried that torch proudly.
-GARY GRAFF
Here's Jake's review:
Van Morrison's show at The Fox in Detroit was an emotional one, not only for him, but the crowd as well.
Starting right at 7:30pm the night ranged from rockin', to spiritually touching, then laughs among Van and the band along with crowd..Things also ended as expected 90 minutes later.
Both In the Afternoon/Ancient Highway/Raincheck and the closing moments of The Burning Ground with Van and Katie Kissoon brought tears to even a lot grown men's eyes. Van came off sounding a little angry and highly passionate during some songs and added something like "and with the Joot, we'll take the ------------ to the burning ground."
I've always said, if angel's do exist they have to look and sound like Katie Kissoon.
The only down side for me was that Van did not introduce or mention any of the band members name's to the crowd. As he walked off he just said the usual "thank you. big hand for the band." Sarah Jory is a woman of many musical talents and she is already a star the way she came off.
Mike's review:
Van is on a roll! The Detroit audience (very enthusiastic) made me proud one more time and I'll bet Detroit will be on Van's wavelength in the coming years... This particular setlist which has now been reported on, is definitely a crowd pleaser and that is likely driving Van to trot out some long missed classics. We heard St. Dominic's Preview and Domino along with much of the recent new additions previously mentioned in the past two nights. I'm sure many in our group will report more detail, but suffice to say, Van did not disappoint the sold out Fox Theater crowd and seemed to be enjoying the charged atmosphere with some comments about Clint Eastwood and "Plum Fine Day" -- "whatever that means.... and a few more light moments with a very upbeat band that just seems to be so comfortable -- which brings up another great version of "Comfortably Numb".... Absolutely lovely!
Setlist:
Wild Night
Tupelo Honey/Why Must I Always Explain?
St. Dominick's Preview
Keep It Simple
That's Entrainment
Wavelength
Comfortably Numb
Behind the Ritual
In the Afternoon/Ancient Highway/Raincheck
Domino
Rough God
Ballerina
Help Me
The Burning Ground
And the Healing Has Begun
Gloria
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
Katie Kissoon & Vanessa Haynes, background vocals
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
Important Masterwork Currently In Progress
From Van's YouTube channel, Official Exile Films, comes news of a very important masterwork currently in progress by Van Morrison - watch for details from vanmorrison.com.
Stay tuned!
08-Jul-08 Chicago Concert Review
Illinois Entertainer:
Anyone who has seen Van Morrison knows there’s no telling what mood he’ll be in, what genre he’ll focus on, what hits he’ll sing (if any), or how long he’ll play. At 62, with 35 self-produced solo CDs under his belt, Morrison is certainly entitled to do whatever he pleases, though in recent years, has grown increasingly quirky and sometimes downright cranky. Signs greeted concertgoers that no alcohol would be served this particular evening and that anyone who took a picture or used a cell phone would be immediately ejected. While the rules appeared stiff, they weren’t uncalled for considering top-tier tickets were priced at an outrageous $300 — certainly enough to guarantee no distractions.
The question of Morrison giving attendees their money’s worth is certainly debatable. He played 90 minutes on the dot, had nine impressive backers, and was very efficient (though not overly proficient) at everything from guitar to harmonica to saxophone. Banter between songs was kept to a bare minimum and, at times, the vocals were so garbled they made Bob Dylan sound crystal clear, but even so, Morrison was equally intriguing as a cult-like character and intricate genre jumper.
Though it appeared the concert would take cues from 2007’s career-spanning hits collection, Still On Top (Polydor), thanks to the lively opener “Wild Night,” it was one of the very few immediately recognizable moments for the casual fan. Of course, many ticket holders were repeat customers, as evidenced by the howls that greeted tunes from 2008’s stripped down, narrative-based Keep It Simple (Lost Highway) and just about every other deep cut, cover, and random jam. As has become a tradition, the merger of R&B romancer “Tupelo Honey” and the similarly structured “Why Must I Always Explain?” earned feverish reception and both sounded superb, even if the headliner was subdued in movement.
He loosened up a bit for the fresh “That’s Entrainment,” perhaps due to its curious phrasing, spiraling acoustic core, and country-tipped sensibilities. The stylistic melting pot continued with a psychedelic rendering of Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb” (during which Morrison traded verses with two enchanting background vocalists) to his own brew of Irish rock on the tried-and-true “Wavelength.” “Ballerina” was delicately plucked from 1968’s ground-breaking Astral Weeks, though the tender tune was overly indulgent in jazzy jamming, a grievance later corrected via a gospel-tinged treatment of “Burning Ground” and the Celtic-centered “And The Healing Has Begun.”
Although these overhauled selections provided the converted with a tasty trip through the vaults, they were likely to leave the radio-minded confused.
Despite purebred nostalgia never being his bag, at least one or two additional hits would’ve struck a better balance, with the omission of “Brown Eyed Girl” and “Gloria” appearing especially arrogant. But as Morrison abruptly exited after a sole encore, soulfully scatting with his back to the crowd, he only increased the mystique that has steadily evolved across almost five decades, suggesting a mixture of commercial indifference and unwavering confidence account for his longevity.
–Andy Argyrakis
Art shares his impressions:
Incredible show in Chicago, great band, excellent vocals, tremendous setlist. Only downside.. no John Allair. On Comfortably Numb Van explains it's not the kind of song he usually does, but it ended up in a movie and the Sopranos, so "we're going to do it". Katie Kissoon duets, singing the verses, while Van does the chorus. Ballerina had Van on acoustic, Paul on stand up bass, Sarah on acoustic. This ends with a longish jam, Van singing his guitar part as he plays it. I didn't' think this jam jelled particularly well, but keep reading for one that did. Burning Ground was sung with Katie Kissoon, in an arrangement I haven't heard before, driving beat and lots of percussion. And the Healing Has Begun had a great violin solo, and nice guitar solo from Van. Madame George - great vocal, singing all the verses, and ending with an ecstatic jam, highlighted by Van on acoustic and Tony Fitzgibbon on violin: "The love that loves to love the love that loves to love that loves... in the wind and the rain in the backstreet, way down home in the backstreet.."
Then van takes the wireless mike and starts a rhythmic, slow, elegant shuffle toward the wings as he scats the end of the song. The band finishes the song, the crowd goes wild.. Wow...
As two different people told me, if he does the same show tomorrow in Detroit, they'll be really happy. Me too.
The show ran about 100 minutes, and almost 30 was devoted to the Astral Weeks songs. This is a show people will be talking about for a long time..
Setlist:
1. Wild Night
2. Tupelo Honey>Why Must I Always Explain
3. in the Midnight
4. Keep It Simple
5. That's Entrainment
6. Help Me/Dimples/Help Me
7. Comfortably Numb
8 Wavelength
9. Ballerina
10. The Way Young Lovers Do
11. School of Hard Knocks
12. Behind the Ritual
13. In The Afternoon>Ancient Highway>Raincheck
14. Burning Ground
15. And the Healing Has Begun>The Healing Game
17. Madame George
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
Katie Kissoon & Vanessa Haynes, background vocals
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
07-Jul-08 Toronto Concert Review
The Star:
Van Morrison got down to business with tightly policed set of hits and tunes from new album.
When Van Morrison gets things done, he gets things done Van Morrison's way.
The costly tickets for the storied Irish curmudgeon's gig at Massey Hall last night threatened in bold face a start time of "7 P.M. SHARP," but it was amazing to see how many concertgoers didn't take Morrison's punctuality seriously. They were still streaming in by the dozens from lines extending down Shuter and Victoria Sts. as the first strains of a languid version of "Wild Night" wafted through the lobby.
The efficiency didn't stop there, though.
There was some grumbling outside afterwards in unexpected daylight when Van had waved farewell and stalked to stage left after a curt encore version of "Gloria" little more than 90 minutes later, but they'd just experienced a relentless 90 minutes of music. There was, in fact, so little fat in this tightly policed set list – scarcely any banter, solos trimmed to the bare minimum, little room to roam in the arrangements, one song ceding abruptly to the next – that the whole thing probably would've clocked in at 90 minutes on the nose if Morrison hadn't taken a few extra minutes to yell at his keyboard player to provide some background music while he introduced a cover of Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb" by insinuating that he didn't really care for Pink Floyd.
"I didn't know what the hell it was. That wasn't my scene," he said in his intro, repeating it for emphasis when the crowd tittered in response. This wasn't meant as a joke. "No. It wasn't my scene."
No matter. The cover – conducted with lovely call-and-response vocals from two of the three female backup singers (one of whom played a mean steel guitar) in Morrison's nine-piece band and concluded with the droll remark: "I have to say I'm not numb, and I'm not comfortable" – was just this shy of brilliant, anyway, as was much of the evening's fare.
A reputation for uneven live shows precedes him, but the 62-year-old Morrison has obviously cracked the whip mercilessly on his current tour to support album No. 35, Keep It Simple.
He's cracking the whip on himself as much as his astonishingly disciplined backup crew; although that famous bark can't really be bothered to enunciate as much as it once did ("Ishamarvelluhnighforamoonance..." now goes the intro to Morrison's most famous tune), but he would match his gifted, jazz-schooled bandmates solo for solo on sax, harp and guitar as the evening wore on.
The easygoing new tunes scattered through the set – "Keep It Simple," "That's Entrainment," "Lover Come Back" – weren't shamed in comparison to more hallowed surroundings that included a soulful "Sometimes We Cry," jazzbo romps through "Moondance" and "St. James Infirmary," Sonny Boy Williamson's "Help Me," a rousing "St. Dominic's Preview" and genuinely soulful versions of the Latin-tinged "Ballerina" and the lovely "And the Healing has Begun" that prove there is indeed a beating heart beneath that mobster-lookin' exterior.
That heart is the secret. It takes balls to pull off R & B-styled "I wanna make love to you" come-ons as an Irish white man, but Morrison gets away with it `cause there's a soft touch lurking in there.
Honestly, you should have heard the girlish squeals going up behind Massey Hall when he came out to his car. The cat's onto something.
- Ben Rayner
Canoe-Jam:
TORONTO - When you go to a concert you ideally hope you get your money's worth and the artist in question makes every second onstage count.
For fans of Irish soul icon Van Morrison, those two criteria become all the more crucial considering the steep cost for his tickets and his occasional erratic, unpredictable short shows.
So when the 62-year-old singer sauntered out with his nine-piece supporting cast at Massey Hall Monday evening, the ensuing 95-minute set was quite worthwhile but still had some strange twists and turns.
Van Morrison, touring behind this year's Keep It Simple album, kicked things off with Wild Night before finally working off any noticeable vocal rust with the light and soulful Tupelo Honey, directing his band with subtle hand gestures when not belting out lyrics or tooting his own horn as he did during a few saxophone solos.
"And now for something completely different," he said prior to the rather roots-y title track off the new record. But he shone on the blues-tinged That's Entrainment, a phrase defined by Van Morrison as basically being lost in the music.
Fortunately for fans which filled most of the venue at the early start time of seven o'clock, the performer was often lost in that music, whether it was the strong effort he gave on In The Afternoon or on the groovier Cleaning Windows.
However it was around this time when the concert started to get interesting, be it for good or bad reasons. With his group eagerly waiting for the next song title to be uttered by the main man, Van Morrison nailed Saint James Infirmary with its morose, New Orleans jazz funeral introduction.
From there, he threw his band and the crowd a true curveball. "Just play something, anything while I talk," he quickly scolded keyboardist/trumpeter Paul Moran before introducing the next song: a cover of Pink Floyd's Comfortably Numb.
The track, which Van Morrison originally performed back in 1990 when Roger Waters staged the classic Pink Floyd album The Wall live in Berlin, resulted in some hair-raising, spine-tingling moments on this night. While looking down at a lyrics sheet, he managed to make the song into his own with his unique, powerful range and passion.
"I hope you liked that," he said. "I'm not numb and I'm not comfortable."
Yet for all he showcased on that particular track, Van Morrison came back down to earth in a hurry during Raincheck. While the song contains the lyric, "I don't fade away unless I choose," some of the lyrics had faded from his memory on this night. "I can't remember the last words," he quickly ad-libbed before adding "the show must go on."
Meanwhile, his rendition of Moondance seemed a bit flat as he let his two female backing vocalists take lead for a verse.
Following the somewhat spiritual tone to And The Healing Has Begun (during which he mentioned Ronnie Hawkins who was in attendance), Van Morrison exited only to quickly return for Gloria, capping off a night that was far from B-O-R-I-N-G.
-JASON MACNEIL
Eyeweekly.com
I will give this to the Baby Boom generation: it can clap like a motherfucker. Where concertgoers my age are too easily distracted by their phones and cameras and the need to yell something witty between songs, Boomers go to a show to pound their hands together — sharply on the beat during songs, and with great zeal between them. They know how to show a man with a microphone some love.
And even when that love seems unrequited, it doesn't faze them. Van Morrison didn't likely much care that a third of his constituency was still queued around the corner outside Massey Hall last night when he walked on stage; when Van says a concert starts at seven pm sharp, well heck, that's when the first note's going to be played, and let the fans catch up if they can. So the poor Massey ushers were no doubt grateful that the sell-out crowd wasn't twenty years younger when Van and his nine-piece band strode out for a spirited take on "Wild Night."
For an artist who's developed a reputation for doing whatever he damn well pleases on stage, it was a broad, genial opener — and more importantly, for an artist who's turned in a great many indifferent performances over the last couple of decades, it was good. The band rollicked along with Van playing guitar, his delivery impassioned and his phrasing clear and precise.
The still-settling audience didn't hold Morrison's punctuality against him. They clapped after the fiddle solo, the steel guitar solo, the organ solo and several rose to their feet to applaud the end of the song. And when Van decided to stay in 1971 and offer up a full-voiced "Tupelo Honey," well, the crowd was justifiably delighted. "This is already better than the last time I saw him," somebody near the back of the hall whispered to a seatmate.
Though the crispness Morrison and company flaunted on those first two songs didn't hold, the crowd's rapture did. Decked out in full Dublin gangster regalia — dark suit, dark smoked glasses, dark fedora with a sprig of something red in the band—Van led his musicians into a couple of numbers from his most recent release, Keep It Simple, a collection of mostly unremarkable bluesy shuffles. Van's fans gave them an encouraging welcome.
The evening progressed through songs from across his vast catalogue, with a couple of old blues chestnuts thrown in for good measure — Sonny Boy Williamson's "Help Me" and "St. James Infirmary," on which Van played a decent sax. Almost every number chugged along at the same pleasant medium tempo, giving Morrison room to scat around his two female backing vocalists and giving his accompanists space to trade solos while Morrison stood with his back to the audience and pondered the curtains at the rear of the stage. He addressed his public occasionally and briskly. Only rarely were the arrangements anything less than perfectly tasteful, with one victim an unfortunate rendition of "Moondance" that veered too far into Jazz Lite territory.
Morrison's phrasing wasn't as consistently articulate as on those opening songs. Through the middle of the set, he was sometimes more distinct, sometimes less; on some numbers he may as well not have been singing any words at all for verses at a time, just mixing his patented gurgles and rasps and keens with an occasional shout-out to an R&B legend. When he improvised something self-effacing after forgetting the words to the last verse of "Ballerina," from 1968's Astral Weeks, you wondered what was the point. He could have glossed right over it, as he did elsewhere in the set. "DIGGIdiggiDIGGIdiggifizzalandstay — JELLYROLL," he sung late in "And the Healing Has Begun," and whether or not he could be bothered to enunciate the lyrics he'd written 30 years earlier, his voice was in rude health, big and resonant.
The crowd whooped for every vocal run, and at the mention of every icon. Big Joe Turner, Little Richard, Jimmy Witherspoon, all namechecked. When it came Ronnie Hawkins' turn, the crowd roared, and The Hawk, from his seat in the middle of the audience, nodded and grinned.
So Van gave his admirers a concert with passages of focused genius, some of casual brilliance, and some of gifted indifference — which beats the diminished live reputation he's earned over the years and particularly of late. He remained in a populist mood, zipping through favourites like "St. Dominic's Preview" and "Wavelength." Perhaps the truest measure of his generosity of song choice came near the end, as he ordered his organist to give him a little background music while he talked.
"This is a song I learned in Berlin in 1989," he said, explaining that at the time he didn't know Roger Waters or Pink Floyd, or their hit "Comfortably Numb." "It wasn't my scene," he said, and when the audience cheered for that, he snapped, "No, really — it wasn't my scene." But the version Van had sung on had been used in a popular Scorsese film last year, and so he was going to do it tonight. Pandering to the crowd? Maybe Van did care, after all.
They cheered when the band started playing, one of the backup singers handling the verses, and they roared when Van joined his band to sing the first chorus, reading the lyrics from a music stand. He sang the second chorus, too, letting his backup handle the rest. And at the song's conclusion it drew the biggest standing ovation of the night.
The biggest, that is, save that which the crowd summoned at the end, after just over 90 minutes of music. Having left the stage during the last bars of "And the Healing Has Begun," Morrison wandered back on with a harmonica for a perfunctory belting-out of "Gloria" to close the set proper. Then with all Massey on its feet, he ambled offstage, and followed by his musicians after a few minutes of vamping. The crowd remained standing, whistling and clapping. Even as the house lights came up they cheered, though the stage was empty, an encore declined. Fickle, fickle Van. Ain't love a bitch?
-Jordan Timm
Dan checks in:
We walked into the beautiful Massey Hall in the light, spent one hour and 37 minutes bathed in the light of the music, and exited into the fading light of the day. We got some of the sacred texts tonight. Van often in wailing, prayerful, plaintive voice
At the end of 'Comfortably Numb', Van told that audience that "I hope you
liked that. I am not numb, and I am not comfortable." Ballerina was unbelievably beautiful. St. Dominic's Preview like a hymn. Gloria with some "who do you love" lyrics as a tribute to Ronnie Hawkins, who was in the audience.
Setlist:
Wild Night
Tupelo Honey> Why Must I Always Explain
Keep It Simple
That's Entrainment
In the Afternoon>Raincheck
Wavelength
Moondance
Help Me
Lover Come Back
Sometimes We Cry
St. James Infirmary
Cleaning Windows
Comfortably Numb
Ballerina
St. Dominic's Preview
And the Healing Has Begun
Gloria
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
Katie Kissoon & Vanessa Haynes, background vocals
Wednesday, July 02, 2008
I Got My Name Up In Lights
Dan Fogelberg: Is it true you were a sideman for Van Morrison in your early career?No, that's not the truth. I never worked for Van Morrison. I did however, open several concerts for Van and his band in 1971. My manager at the time, Irving Azoff was working for a booking agency that booked Van Morrison, so he sent me out with my guitar to open his shows solo. Generally it was me, Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks and thenVan and his band. Strange show, but somehow it seemed to work.
David Gray: "My heroes are people like Van Morrison, John Martyn and Nick Drake, and there are some of my songs where these influences are fairly apparent."
Ray Charles: "They asked me to come to New York to help celebrate Van's induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. I went because I see Van as one of the cats that has kept the faith. Like me, he's always himself—he stays true to the music that means the most to him. It meant a lot to sing `Crazy Love' on stage with Van that evening. That's what you hear at the end of Genius Loves Company, me and Van live."'
Maura O'Connell: Deserted-island discs1. Poetic Champions Compose, Van Morrison. This was the first Vanalbum that I felt connected to. I was about 19, so it came out duringa seminal time in my life.
Ronan Keating: What do you listen to these days?RK: I've been listening to a lot of Van Morrison – both old and new.He's got an awesome voice, and it's amazing how he's never faded withage. Of the newer bands, I like Train and Coldplay.
Tom Jones: "If you're doing something Van understands and likes, he's great,"Jones says. "And if the musicians are playing the way he wants themto play, he's great. But if there's a fly in the ointment he justwalks away. He didn't like the drummer on the session so he said, 'Iwant you to change places with the percussionist.' So the drummer changed places with the percussionist and the percussionist played drums, and Van didn't like him either. Instead of trying to explain to these drummers what he did want, he walked out of the studio."Jones continues, "I said to the guy that handles him, 'What now? Whatare we going to do now?' He said, 'Van doesn't like these drummers,so we have to send to London for a drummer he knows and then we'llhave another go at it.' The session was at Van's studio in Bath, sowe had to wait about four or five hours to get this drummer fromLondon. But once Van heard him play and it gelled, he was good asgold.""The collaborations were just incredible. I went to Van and he wastotally for it as long as we did it on one of his songs ['SometimesWe Cry'], which was totally fine by me. Just to sing with him, what a thrill."
Terry George: Tongue in cheek, George recounted how he has finally become famous in his homeland. Last February, along with another Belfast boy, Van Morrison, George was honored at the second annual “Oscar Wilde: Honoring Irish Writing in Film” event in Los Angeles.“I was shocked that Van showed up because he’s notoriously shy, and he had a 12-piece band with him and proceeded to blow the hall away.” George recalled. “Word gets around back home and I’m hearing from my mother and brother and others back in Ireland telling me, ‘Terry, you’ve made it - you were on stage with Van Morrison!’”
Pete Doherty: ...launching into his very best Kate Moss impression, 'She was like "You know what actually I don't think that goes there very well, and that line doesn't work and na na na"."So I'd just keep the peace really", he continued, "You just change the odd line, take suggestions. I think she was listening to a lot of Van Morrison at the time, that song 'The Way Young Lovers Do' and something about Utah and a pair of red shows. So yeah, that's her contribution."It seems however that Doherty's memory of that period of time may just be a tiny bit hazy as it's Van Morrison's 'Astrals Track' which references red shoes, and 'Natalia' which contains the lyrics 'You Talk'.
John Bell (Widespread Panic): THE EAR: Who are your musical influences? What are your favorite albums or CDs?BELL: At home, I listen to the whole Van Morrison catalog. I always have my ear peeled for new Van Morrison stuff that comes out. He’s so prolific; he puts out a new album every six months so. I feel lucky to get to be a fan and not be picking his songs apart for song structure, a pitfall that comes with being a musician.I’ve never seen Van Morrison live, but at the end of our last tour, we missed him by one day when he played Atlanta. If it had been a day earlier, I’d have been there.
Jenna Bush: She (Laura Bush) loves music. My dad (President Bush) does, too. And Van Morrison, I mean, they both love Van Morrison.
Nick Lowe: What's amazing, he says, is "I always think that that song (Peace, Love & Understanding) was the first actual original idea that I had. Up till then, I'd been figuring out how to write songs, and, really, I was still rewriting the Band's tunes or Van Morrison's tunes, whoever I thought was really good back then, because that's how anybody starts: You copy the people you admire."
Glen Hansard: Hansard told me they shot the entire film ("Once") in 17 days, and in it he played street versions of several Van Morrison songs. Hansard had met and chatted with Morrison in the past (pictured below), and didn’t feel he’d have a hard time getting permission to use them. But when he called Morrison’s people to ask for permission, he got a one word answer: No!“But does he know it’s for me, Glen Hansard? The one he chatted with? The one from The Frames?” Hansard pleaded. “Yes, he knows exactly who youare,” the assistant replied. “He knows all that, and he still says no, even though you probably already shot them, didn’t you?”
Hansard was crestfallen. They had indeed already shot the scenes with Morrison’s songs, and there was no money or time to reshoot. His only option was to call back again and beg. After several minutes of groveling, Morrison himself got on the phone. “Of course you can use the songs!” he said. He was just toying with Hansard. Interestingly enough, those songs didn’t make it into the film’s final cut.But a soulful version of "Into the Mystic" did make it into the concert Hansard and Irglova (pictured above) played for us last night at the Landmark.
Brian Kennedy: Kennedy began his music career combining work as a solo artist with a five-year stint backing another Belfast boy, Van Morrison, in the 1990s. It was through that association that he first became acquainted with Best, the '60s star of Manchester United and one of the greatest soccer players of all time."I knew him a little bit because any time I played Manchester with Van, George would show up," he says. "There were a couple of occasions when me and Van and George would end up having a drink together at the hotel. Being around that and listening to these two legends, who were roughly the same age and both from east Belfast ... that was a great privilege, just to sit there and listen to them."
Bap Kennedy: "I've known Van since he took an interest in my first band, EnergyOrchard, in the late 1980s," he explains."Being fellow Belfast lads, we got talking and he said 'Do you fancy writing a song together?'"Needless to say, I said yes, so we got the acoustic guitars out,threw a lot of lines at each other and, 20 minutes later, there was the song."Wasn't it a bit scary working with one of your heroes though?"Not at all," he says, laughing at the memory."Basically, we were just two guys sitting together writing a song."
Julia Stiles: "When I was little, every Sunday my mom would play St. Dominics Preview while cleaning the house... it had a great album cover of a blue church & Van sitting in front of it... I stole the record from her and put it on my wall.Recently I bought the cd and can't stop listening to it. My favorite track is Redwood Tree St. Dominics Preview while cleaning the house... it had a great album cover of a blue church & Van sitting in front of it... I stole the record from her and put it on my wall.Recently I bought the cd and can't stop listening to it. My favorite track is Redwood Tree St. Dominics Preview while cleaning the house... it had a great album cover of a blue church & Van sitting in front of it... I stole the record from her and put it on my wall.Recently I bought the cd and can't stop listening to it. My favorite track is Redwood Tree with the line "Oh Redwood Tree, please let us under..." - very comforting."
Eric Clapton: "Q: Did you enjoy “The Last Waltz” [the Band’s farewell concert in 1976, in which Clapton, Bob Dylan and a host of greats performed]?A: I did, yeah. A fantastic event. I loved it... For me, Muddy [Waters] and Van [Morrison] steal the show. Van doing [“Caravan”] with the leg kicks. Some of the greatest live music you’ll ever see.
Sinead O'Connor: "'Beside You' is Morrison talking to his girlfriend, but you wouldn't realise that until the end. There are many versions of this song but the TB Sheets version is my personal favourite. It's typical of his style lyrically, a stream of consciousness. He's a great storyteller - this onestarts with: "Little Jimmy's gone way out of the backstreet, out of the window through the fallin' rain", and it soon becomes very hypnotic. Really, he's telling her that a million things might happen and a long time might pass but he'll always be there beside her. The line I never forget is: "The dynamo of your smile reflects the barefoot virgin child." I never heard Van until I was 18 and I'd moved to London and this guy from a record company gave me his records. The thing I like about his early stuff is that they only have two chords, but you wouldn't know it because of how he plays and his voice.
Dr. John ('77): With Van, I just think he’s a hell of a singer. He’s an amazing singer considering he’s from Ireland and all of this, that he sounds like he’s from West Memphis, Arkansas or something. I think the cat is phenomenal!He’ll do some more classic records I’m sure in his time. He’s gonna have plenty, plenty product that’ll be fantastic.
Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell: Mayor of Nashville Bill Purcell recently made local music legend Van Morrison an honorary citizen of the American city.During a visit to Belfast last week he told how Morrison was " appreciative" of the accolade, but not exactly "chatty"!"I found him communicative, appreciative and very pleased to be in Nashville," said Mr Purcell."But chatty would not describe Van Morrison," he joked.
Tim Finn: “We maybe do one or two of our own, but we’ll mostly do The Beatles or songs like ‘Wild Thing.’ We do a Van Morrison song called ‘The Irish Heart Beat,’ which we sang at our mother’s funeral. That’s getting to be a popular request.
Marty Whelan (RTE TV): Whelan had to find all the strength he could when his dear old dad died on August 11, 1998. "I miss him terribly," he tells me. When his father died, Marty played the Enlightenment album by Van Morrison (another only child) all day and night to help him get through it. He always took solace in Morrison's music and quiet contemplation. He even recited See Me Through as a verse by Van Morrison at his dad's funeral...Ten days after his dad's funeral, Marty was presenting the Rose Of Tralee - and Van was a guest on the show. The singer came back to the hospitality room and Marty says he thinks he "bored" Van for an hour. They sat and talked about being only children."It was one of the most special meetings that I ever had with anybody. I have never forgotten it. I am a respecter of his enormous ability to make me feel a whole range of emotions. I told him about how his music had got me through the death of my father."Marty reflects for a moment. "The interesting thing Van said at the end of the conversation was [adopts gruff Van voice]: 'You're not a bit like I thought you'd be.'"
Brian Williams (NBC News): To fellow Sopranos fans: I don't know what's left to say, but I'm not going to give up that easily: how about "Comfortably Numb?" That version with Van Morrison from The Departed soundtrack is, as a friend of mine put it, "Like being in Church." It's a transforming song -- perhaps among the top three Van Morrison recordings of all time.
Taylor Hicks: Q: Who is the one artist you would love to record a duet with?A: "Van Morrison. . . . I haven't (met him). I would love to. Just as a fan it would be cool. It's Too Late To Stop is a great album. I'm into masterpieces because hopefully I'll write one one day.
Kevin Rowland: From Kevin Rowland (Dexys Midnight Runners) blog
It was during the boiling hot summer of 1976 that I first heard it. Punk was about to happen, but this album, showed me something really different. Before that, Van Morrison had been, in my perception, some American type singer..songwriter; long hair, jeans, country rock kinda thing. No thank you very much sir, not my cup of tea.
Then I heard Astral Weeks. What was it? I couldn't understand it, it sounded bizarre and tuneless at first, as if he was making it up as he was going along. Oddly, it happened that I heard the whole album three times that same evening. The circumstances were: I was in a wine bar in Birmingham my girlfriend. It was a lovely hot night and we spent the whole evening there. The woman running the bar, was clearly very into the album, she had it on an 8 Track cartridge machine {popular in the 70s} and instead of stopping when it came to the end of the record, she let it go around and around.
The process in my head went something like this; the first time I heard it; I thought, it sounds like he is just making up the words and the tune, as he goes along, crazy. The second time, I thought, there's more to it than Ifirst realized. I was starting to hear some melody in it, by the third time, I knew there was something powerful going on.That was how I got into Astral Weeks, Van Morrison's first masterpiece. The long term effect it had on me, is something else entirely. That, and one of his other great works of genius; Its Too LateTo Stop Now, brought my understanding of what music could be and mean, to another level. They showed me some of what was possible with music.
Those records expanded the boundaries. I related to the pain and I'd never heard music that touched me so deeply. I hadn't known that music could express and mean so much, and be so serious. The seriousness suited me, that's how I felt. People were always telling me to cheer up.I hadn't known that music could take me beyond where Rock N Roll, straight Soul, Bob Dylan and even the great Roxy Music had {which was a pretty good place anyway} took me.
This was more than Rock N Roll, this was something else. It was genius. That word is used a lot, im not talking about the kind of genius that writes loads of songs or plays loads of instruments, though Van does do those things, im talking about the kind of genius that goes to musical places where others don't and where it must be said, quite a few people maybe don't even know exists! Some people listen to Its Too Late To Stop Now and say "yeah, its nice".
Nice isnt a word that describes it for me. Its a mystery to me that others dont hear what i hear in it, but then maybe they get from some other record, what i get from Astral Weeks and Its Too Late To Stop Now.
Joan Osbourne: There are some songs that I love that are that simple and there’s other songs that are very complicated and abstract and…you listen to Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, half the time you don’t know what the hell he’s talking about. But it’s beautiful.
Peter Wolf: Back in 1968, the Boston Tea Party was the premier club for rock bands. My band, the Hallucinations, composed of art-school dropouts heavily drenched in R&B and Chicago blues, used the club as a rehearsal hall whenever it was available. The music we played could be described as primal, raw and heavy on attitude. We were in the midst of rehearsing one day, getting ready to open for the great bluesman Howlin' Wolf, when something caught my eye, and I looked over to see a stranger looming in the doorway. I had no idea who he was or what he was doing there, so I went over to find out what he wanted. In a thick brogue, he asked about places to play in Boston.Once I figured out who it was, I was both excited and perplexed. Excited because I'd known and admired Van's work from his debut on the charts with his group Them. Perplexed because he seemed so lost and adrift. Despite the recent Top Forty success of his song "Brown Eyed Girl," he'd been having difficulty establishing his identity as a solo artist, but that couldn't account for the bleakness of his mood.As we talked, it became clear that we shared a passion for the same kind of music. Van gradually loosened up, and we made plans to get together again. He started dropping by the FM station where I used to do an all-night radio show. Soon we began to hang together, going out carousing in the night and sometimes getting into more mischief than we bargained for.Van was living in a small, street-level apartment in an old wooden house on Green Street in Cambridge. He, his new wife, her young son. They were flat-out broke. The place was bleak and barren, with little more than a mattress on the floor, a refrigerator, an acoustic guitar and a reel-to-reel tape recorder. They had no phone and little food. It was hard times: He was in exile, with a family to feed, no money, no band, no recording contract and no promise of any safe or legal way out. Even the reason he moved to Boston remained a mystery.Whenever Van had to make business calls, he would walk several blocks to my place to use the phone. It seemed that my apartment also offered him a break from the near-despair of his complicated and unresolved life. He would spend endless hours going through my records. Over and over we would listen to what he called "the gospel" of Jackie Wilson, Ray Charles, Hank Williams, Louis Jordan, Billy Stewart, Elvis and John Lee Hooker. "They're the real deal," he'd say. He played Gene Chandler's live version of "Rainbow '65" so much, I had to get a new needle for my turntable.Many nights were spent checking out different clubs, but few people knew who Van was. Sometimes he would show up at my band's gigs. One night, as we started the intro to his song "Gloria," I called him onstage even though he was reluctant to sing it. When he came up, he went into a brilliant scat that rivaled King Pleasure himself. Unfortunately, the audience didn't want this "unknown" singer changing the familiar delivery of a song that was fast becoming a true rock classic.Eventually, Van managed to assemble a two-piece acoustic band and booked himself at a coffeehouse/jazz club that could only be described as subterranean. It was located three stories below a pool parlor and was deep, damp and dark. Egyptian motifs were painted on its yellow smoke-stained walls. The club justly deserved its name, the Catacombs. I borrowed a tape machine to capture the evening's music. What he performed that night later turned out to be the song cycle that made up the groundbreaking Astral Weeks. Though only a handful showed up, when Van finished playing, there was no doubt that the few present had witnessed something extraordinary.As I stood at the side of the stage last summer and watched Van perform for an ecstatic audience of several thousand, I saw the same raw power and passion that he had displayed more than thirty years ago in the long-forgotten Catacombs. Once again, I admired the strength and mysterious ability to transcend the despair and chaos that could have so easily trapped and overwhelmed him. Mastering his art, he has created a body of work that reflects without imitation. It embodies the exaltation of the spirit. The gospel according to Van. "Turn it up, turn it up, a little bit higher. . . . You know it's got soul . . . and it's too late to stop now!"
Candy Dulfer: Q: Van is another one who doesn't talk to the press. What's he like?A: He's a little bit grumpy-looking, so people think he's mad, but underneath he's got the biggest heart of all. With Van, the best way to communicate is through the music. I know more about him from the solos than from the yak, yak, yak.
Hal Ketchum: While he admits not listening to the radio much, Ketchum does listen to other musicians. "I'm a big Van Morrison fan," he said.
Cyndi Lauper: I still love Ani DiFranco, old Annie Lennox, Bill Withers, Van Morrison, Mavis Staples.
Taj Mahal: But he really first encountered his British counterparts late at night listening to the radio. "Early Van Morrison, Them -- what great records those were," he says. "I remember laying up at midnight saying 'who the heck is this guy 'cause he knows where the music is. I can feel it in the back of my neck.' I love Van.
Bob Seger: "One of the things I patterned my writing and career after, one of the people was Van Morrison....there were about seven or eight albums in a row, and they were consistently good. Van Morrison's albums never sounded the same to me, and I think that was one of the things I really admired about him and I tried to pattern myself after." Radio Interview, World Premier of The Fire Inside, with Redbeard"There's a whole little clique of male vocalists. We're just sort of all connected. I think every last one of us has a connection with Van Morrison.""I got from him [Van Morrison] a sense of commitment. I heard like six straight albums that were not always exactly similar but they were committed in that one direction, white R&B. Blammo, nothing else. Maybe a little bit of country, maybe a little bit of jazz, but basically headed in that one direction. He was committed. And that to me was really important, his consistency was fantastic." Dave Marsh, June 15, 1978, Rolling Stone. "Bob Seger: Not A Stranger Anymore.""He has this great poetic...and fantastic voice...and what I love about Van, and what I forget to do sometimes is, well...I can tell when Van is just like drifting into sort of a zone...he just drifts into a place where the whole world is shut out and you can tell that he's in that spot. It's almost a dream-like, trance-like state, singing sometimes. That's really what music is all about. It's almost a jazz concept if you know what I mean...you just kinda go out and you're just...wingin' it...and I love that about Van, he will risk that, he will go on and on and on...and he won't fade the ending before the magic happens, as it were." Interview on Later with Bob Costas.
Pierce Brosnan: "I love to paint, play tennis, kayak, ride my bike, listen to Van Morrison and Bruce Springsteen, sit and look at the ocean — and worry," Brosnan said.
George Jones (Belfast DJ): I used to play music with Van Morrison and he would have been round in our house a lot, where we practised. Mum was always on hand with a wee cup of tea - and advice if we needed it. Clearly, Van had something special about him even then. He was writing poetry, and no matter what instrument he lifted he could get a sound out of it. What about his public image as a grumpy man? I'd say he was just quiet and private - he always was. But when he was out playing with us lads he opened up - music gave him that gateway. We meet up now and again, and when I had a documentary made about my life he flew home to take part in it, which I really appreciated.Did he say anything about Radio Ulster dropping my show? There was a bit of a comment. I'm sure he was annoyed - he knows that I, like him, like good music and that's what I was trying to do with the show.
Bob Geldof: Van Morrison's intuitive mixing of twin traditional cultures, the Blues and Irish roots, married to a Yeatsian imagery, generated an entirely new musical vernacular. Van allowed me, and I suppose millions of others to hear for the first time the glory of another music hauled seamlessly, timelessly into the present. Not the cod nonsense of my youth but art - true music. It dawned on me that in all those years I had never actually heard true traditional Irish music and I was chastened.
Jake Holmes: WS: Do you remember your extended run with Van Morrison at The Bitter End in '67?JH: (Irish accent) Do I have the stories for you there, me lad! (chuckling mischievously) We worked with Van at The Bitter End. He had this pick-up band. Charlie Brown and this drummer . . . they were flat-out freaks. They were total drug-crazed people. He decided he was going to get three backup singers. So he hired three black Bronx girls who had never been in The Village before in their life. They didn't know anything about rock n roll or folk music. They were R & B backup singers.Van had apparently gotten enamoured with The Who. And there he is on stage doing "T.B. Sheets" and he's knocking the glasses off the tables in the front with his feet. He's kicking the microphone stand over. He's smashing into the drum set, crashing into everything. He's taking the microphone . . . and these girls are in the background singing (sings in high falsetto) "Oww, T.B. sheets!" . . . and he's swinging the microphone over his head and it's missing . . . Charlie Brown and the drummer could care less . . . but he's swinging the microphone over the girls' heads and they're ducking and their eyes are getting bigger and bigger. They don't know what the hell's going on. What is this guy doing? They finally look at each other and go off stage. Van keeps on with "T.B. Sheets," screaming and yelling and kicking and breaking shit and just going nuts.The girls go in the back. I'm sitting in the back of The Bitter End and all of a sudden these girls come out, it was in the winter time, in their fur coats and they walk past the table and I hear one of them say to the other two "That motherfucker's crazy!" All the while Van's still doing "T.B. Sheets." It was one of the funniest moments in my life.
[Image via Framing Worlds]
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