19-Jun-11 Irish Feis - Finsbury Park, London, England
Petra sent theis review
Jimmy Cliff was the first gig we joined in the afternoon – who said it’s an Irish festival. The reggae sounds brought a merry Caribbean feeling to Finsbury Park in sunshine – Jimmy and his band a sight for sore eyes with their Jamaican colored drums and costumes, Jimmy dressed all in gold.
The Irish band Clannad delivered smooth harp sounds and angelic singing (a bit boring to my opinion), but then we were woken up by honest and loud folk rock from the Horslips with great e-guitar playing – music legends in Ireland all of them.
But this is the Van Morrison News Blog and, of course, the main reason why we and so many other people traveled to London from far and near is Vantheman. We hadn’t seen him since his last concerts in Germany in 2008. Van gigs in Europe had become scarce after that, and his fans around the world were worrying if he would do any more gigs at all – the latest one was at the Royal Albert Hall in London in October 2010.
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Van was dressed in a black leather jacket and leather waistcoat, fedora and shades as usual. He seemed to be a bit annoyed with some technical issues in the beginning and I feared the worst. Would he turn round on his heel and leave the stage ? But here it came – probably the best of his gigs we joined, so far.
It was obvious from the start that Van not just meant to meet his contractual obligations as we had feared – he tried hard to deliver good quality and give his best. The band was probably not as tight as it could be – maybe they need quite a bit more rehearsals to be fit for the tour we all hope for … But with Jay Berliner playing a wonderful acoustic guitar and with a great horn section they are not far from being perfect. No harmony singers, no fiddle. The sound was beautiful where we stood - for a big event like this. The other musicians were (as far as I know - Van did not introduce the band members this time …): Alistair White on trombone, Chris White on sax, Paul Moore on upright bass, Paul Moran on keyboards and trumpet, Andy Jones (or was it Dave Keary ?) on electric guitar, Jeff Lardner on drums.
The show started with ‘Baby Please Don’t Go’ leading into ‘Here Comes The Night’ and ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ with Van playing sax and a great jazzy fade-out. Now we are through with the crowd pleasers and can focus on what really matters ... Quite smart of Van, I think. Normally the crowd shouts for the “hits” until they get them - what is annoying for everybody.
We were delighted to hear next ‘Fair Play’ from the sublime 1974 Veedon Fleece album. It faded into Van’s mumbled phrasing of ‘church bell chime’ and ‘are you there ?’.
‘Have I Told You Lately’ for once was not the awful fast Las Vegas version but sung slowly with a feeling, beautiful muted trumpet sound in the background. ‘Wavelength’ was next – never heard it live before ... ‘It’s All In The Game’ with Van playing sax again. And then a wonderful version of ‘In The Garden’ – had hoped so much to hear this one on our previous gigs years ago … This time ‘No Guru’ had an interesting lyric variation: Van sang ‘holy guardian angel’ instead of ‘holy ghost’, looking up into the bright blue evening sky when singing this line … I think listening to this wonderful song brought tears not only to my eyes … Then he murmured something like ‘Live is something completely different’ …
The only really Irish reminiscence was ‘Star Of The County Down’ getting great audience acclaim, of course. Maybe the most amazing song of this evening was his ‘Ballerina’ version ending up in an unusual rock rhythm – never heard that before.
The nightshirt in ‘Help Me’ with a harp playing Van is an indicator that the show comes to an end. A barn-storming ‘Gloria’ was last as usual – then it was done. No word to the audience – Van wanders off the stage, playing his harp while the band continues to play .. As always.
Bridgit's review
Van Morrison - second highlight of the day - entertaining concert, the right mix of fast sing-a-longs and some jazzier standards; started with "Baby please don't go" and ended with - well, of course "Gloria"; "Moondance" could have been longer, "Star of the County Down" had a jazzy touch (reminded me of the Montreux 1990 standard); no setlist here, I'm sure somebody else will provide it... the voice is as good as ever (even though he seemed to struggle). I got pretty much to the front - great sound there, happy people but even amongst the hardcore fans you couldn't get away from the noisy drunkards bumping into you.
PS: Later at the "Twelve Pins" Irish Bar right around the corner they had some fun live music, including yet another shalala Brown Eyed Girl. All these kids were happily dancing to it and singing along. And those I asked all said that their concert highlight of the weekend had been "Van the Man".
-Birgit
Festival Day No. 2 started with promising sunshine – no wellies needed today. The muddy grounds had dried after yesterday’s rain, cleaned from millions of beer cups, and we were fit and eager for more music to come.
Jimmy Cliff was the first gig we joined in the afternoon – who said it’s an Irish festival. The reggae sounds brought a merry Caribbean feeling to Finsbury Park in sunshine – Jimmy and his band a sight for sore eyes with their Jamaican colored drums and costumes, Jimmy dressed all in gold.
The Irish band Clannad delivered smooth harp sounds and angelic singing (a bit boring to my opinion), but then we were woken up by honest and loud folk rock from the Horslips with great e-guitar playing – music legends in Ireland all of them.
But this is the Van Morrison News Blog and, of course, the main reason why we and so many other people traveled to London from far and near is Vantheman. We hadn’t seen him since his last concerts in Germany in 2008. Van gigs in Europe had become scarce after that, and his fans around the world were worrying if he would do any more gigs at all – the latest one was at the Royal Albert Hall in London in October 2010.
So anticipation was growing extremely for the Vanatics as the scheduled time for the Van gig came … Uwe and me were lucky to stand very close to the stage, together with Mike, Brian and Alan – good company. What would be the line-up of his new band ? Which song would be the starter... would he do a mere routine gig, grab his money and run... or a real good show which would show us that he’s back to the world?
Van was dressed in a black leather jacket and leather waistcoat, fedora and shades as usual. He seemed to be a bit annoyed with some technical issues in the beginning and I feared the worst. Would he turn round on his heel and leave the stage ? But here it came – probably the best of his gigs we joined, so far.
It was obvious from the start that Van not just meant to meet his contractual obligations as we had feared – he tried hard to deliver good quality and give his best. The band was probably not as tight as it could be – maybe they need quite a bit more rehearsals to be fit for the tour we all hope for … But with Jay Berliner playing a wonderful acoustic guitar and with a great horn section they are not far from being perfect. No harmony singers, no fiddle. The sound was beautiful where we stood - for a big event like this. The other musicians were (as far as I know - Van did not introduce the band members this time …): Alistair White on trombone, Chris White on sax, Paul Moore on upright bass, Paul Moran on keyboards and trumpet, Andy Jones (or was it Dave Keary ?) on electric guitar, Jeff Lardner on drums.
The show started with ‘Baby Please Don’t Go’ leading into ‘Here Comes The Night’ and ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ with Van playing sax and a great jazzy fade-out. Now we are through with the crowd pleasers and can focus on what really matters ... Quite smart of Van, I think. Normally the crowd shouts for the “hits” until they get them - what is annoying for everybody.
We were delighted to hear next ‘Fair Play’ from the sublime 1974 Veedon Fleece album. It faded into Van’s mumbled phrasing of ‘church bell chime’ and ‘are you there ?’.
Sounds promising – that’s exactly what we had hoped for … ‘ Real Real Gone’ was next, nice to hear this one again. ‘I Can’t Stop Loving You’ – beautiful. The inevitable ‘Moondance’ with Van and Chris on sax and Paul Moran playing a magnificent muted trumpet – a sublime version of the old standard. I began to look around and watch some faces in the audience around me. Many young people, some with Asian or African background, swaying to the music with an enchanted expression on their faces. Looks like Van is going to win over another audience generation for him …
‘Have I Told You Lately’ for once was not the awful fast Las Vegas version but sung slowly with a feeling, beautiful muted trumpet sound in the background. ‘Wavelength’ was next – never heard it live before ... ‘It’s All In The Game’ with Van playing sax again. And then a wonderful version of ‘In The Garden’ – had hoped so much to hear this one on our previous gigs years ago … This time ‘No Guru’ had an interesting lyric variation: Van sang ‘holy guardian angel’ instead of ‘holy ghost’, looking up into the bright blue evening sky when singing this line … I think listening to this wonderful song brought tears not only to my eyes … Then he murmured something like ‘Live is something completely different’ …The only really Irish reminiscence was ‘Star Of The County Down’ getting great audience acclaim, of course. Maybe the most amazing song of this evening was his ‘Ballerina’ version ending up in an unusual rock rhythm – never heard that before.
The nightshirt in ‘Help Me’ with a harp playing Van is an indicator that the show comes to an end. A barn-storming ‘Gloria’ was last as usual – then it was done. No word to the audience – Van wanders off the stage, playing his harp while the band continues to play .. As always.
But Van seemed to be in good shape, good voice, played a lot of great sax solos and was quite obviously doing an effort to deliver a good concert. What he really did. We thought it was probably the best one of the 6 gigs we were lucky to witness, so far. Let’s hope this was the start of a new tour series … It’s Too Late To Stop Now, Van !!
-Petra
Bridgit's review
Van Morrison - second highlight of the day - entertaining concert, the right mix of fast sing-a-longs and some jazzier standards; started with "Baby please don't go" and ended with - well, of course "Gloria"; "Moondance" could have been longer, "Star of the County Down" had a jazzy touch (reminded me of the Montreux 1990 standard); no setlist here, I'm sure somebody else will provide it... the voice is as good as ever (even though he seemed to struggle). I got pretty much to the front - great sound there, happy people but even amongst the hardcore fans you couldn't get away from the noisy drunkards bumping into you.
PS: Later at the "Twelve Pins" Irish Bar right around the corner they had some fun live music, including yet another shalala Brown Eyed Girl. All these kids were happily dancing to it and singing along. And those I asked all said that their concert highlight of the weekend had been "Van the Man".
-Birgit
Setlist (Thanks To Jordi)
Baby Please Don't Go (Van on harp)
Here Comes The Night
Brown Eyed Girl (Nice new version with good horns)
Fair Play
Real Real Gone
I Can't Stop Loving You
Moondance (Few bars of My Funny Valentine)
Have I Told You Lately (Slightly new version of this classic)
Wavelength
All In The Game
In The Garden
Star Of The County Down
Ballerina
Help Me
Gloria
