08-November-2016
Philharmonic Hall
 Liverpool, England

Brendan Hynes sent in this review
Van Morrison opened the first concert of his two night stint at this venue with Too Late from the new album followed in quick succession by Close Enough For Jazz and Look Beyond The Hill which is also on the new album. Rather surprisingly there were to be no more songs from the new album tonight with much of the rest of the show drawn largely from the ‘greatest hits roadshow’ as evidenced by the rather uninspired set list with Van’s more creative work largely unexplored. There were thankfully some exceptions however including the welcome inclusion of Beautiful Vision which featured a great guitar solo from Dave Keary and beautiful backing vocals from Dana Masters. Tore Down A La Rimbaud was terrific and featured great organ playing by Paul Moran.In The Midnight again featured Dana on vocals while Dave Keary played some nice steel guitar and contributed his seemingly impossibly high vocal range towards the song’s ending all of which drew an acknowledgement from Van by way of an outstretched arm. In The Garden made a welcome return although Van didn’t really get immersed in what was a fairly short version and he departed the stage as the song drew to a conclusion. He returned for what turned out to be a pretty terrific version of Gloria as the band really cut loose once Van had departed with Paul Moran adding an extended and quite brilliant trumpet solo into the mix while Paul Moore added to his fan base with a terrific bass solo which was accompanied by the entire audience clapping along while Dana’s terrific vocal/chant at the end drew a rapturous audience response.

While Van was in great voice throughout aided by a superb sound system this was largely a workmanlike performance by him devoid of any real transcendental moments for the audience to savour.

Set List
Too Late
Close Enough For Jazz
Look Beyond The Hill
Magic Time
Baby Please Don’t Go/Parchman Farm/Don’t Start Crying Now
Sometimes We Cry
Have I Told You Lately (fast version)
Precious Time
Enlightenment
Whenever God Shines His Light
Cleaning Windows
Beautiful Vision
Tore Down A La Rimbaud
Carrying A Torch
Moondance
Saint James Infirmary
Jackie Wilson Said
In The Midnight
Brown Eyed Girl
Help Me
In The Garden
Gloria

Big Hand For The Band!
Dave Keary (Guitar)
Paul Moore (Bass)
Paul Moran (Keyboards)
Mez Clough (Drums)
Dana Masters (Vocals)


Set Time: 1h 39m.