(note: this blog is from Friday, August 17, 2007)
May I start by saying Van Morrison is one of my favorite solo artists. Secondly, ‘Brown eyed Girl’ is one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard. This is just a small insight into the complicated relationship I have with Van. It’s all good though because 2 of his albums happen to be in my top favorite albums of all time. Here’s a run down of those 2, as I dub them the essential Van Morrison albums for any ‘Fan of Van’. The albums are Veedon Fleece and Astral Weeks. Here we go:
Veedon Fleece (1974)
Van really stretches is musical legs on this album, both vocally and in musical styles. No album before was he all over the radar with influences of Jazz, R&B, folk, soul. All of which executed with such intensity and skill, tracks seamlessly go one to another, connected by a passion stricken Van who tears it up on every track.
According to this “internet” thing, Van was going through a messy divorce and retreated to his native Ireland to get back in touch with his roots. What sounds like a recipe for a depressing Irish drinking album actually created an album that is very uplifting and spiritual… Van-style.
Allmusic.com says: it’s a record fraught with emotional upheaval, as evidenced by such superior moments as “Linden Arden Stole the Highlights,” “Who Was That Masked Man,” and “You Don’t Pull No Punches, but You Don’t Push the River.”
Astral Weeks (1968)
Allmusic.com: Astral Weeks is generally considered one of the best albums in pop music history. For all that renown, Astral Weeks is anything but an archetypal rock & roll album: in fact, it isn’t a rock & roll album at all… Van Morrison spins out a series of extended ruminations on his Belfast upbringing, including the remarkable character “Madame George” and the climactic epiphany experienced on “Cyprus Avenue.”
Considered his best (I’ll agree) Astral Weeks is a tough pill to swallow at first. It has a free form approach, mainly because the albums core (Van’s Vocals, acoustic guitar, bass, flute) was improvised. Van said hit record, and they just winged it. String arrangements and other instruments would be added in later, but only to accent the amazing flow this album has. Lyrics are poetic and fierce, and there’s no semblance of standard song structures (verse, chorus, verse, etc.).
Upon first hearing this album, the novice music fan might be confessed or just turned off, mainly because this isn’t an album you ‘get’ on the first listen. But, like all great albums, once you do get it, it makes everything else sound that much tamer and boring.
