He has made a tonne of records since the late 60`s and has sold a tonne of records. He writes slick and precise contemporary songs that are predominantly influenced by delta blues, jazz and celtic folk.
He is renowned for playing a saxophone nearly as much as his well documented dummy spits with fellow musicians when they dont play to his exact and all too often unrealistic expectations in the studio and even on stage in a few instances.
Most musicians die to play with him and most musicians think he is a tosser and don't want to go anywhere near him. He`s a walking paradox and a walking contradiction.
His name is Van Morrison, also known as the Belfast Cowboy and Van the Man. Van the Man has a lot of well known songs which I wont bother mentioning, because this blog is all about Lost Treasures.
I really like a lot of Van Morrison songs, certainly two dozen or so of his songs which have been commercially successful over the years have deserved the accolades which they have been given.
Ironically, the one album of Van the Man which I have always found to be boring and a complete non-event is the critically acclaimed `Astral Weeks`, his 60`s debut as a solo artist.
Goes to show that a lot of music critics always were a bit weird. My favourite Van Morrison complete album is the more folk inspired and less contemporary gem from 1971 called `Tupelo Honey`.
For someone who normally likes a more rock and sophisticated edge to their music, I have to admit that I have always wondered a bit why this album done it for me more
than some of Van`s more atmospheric albums in the late 70`s and early to mid 80`s.
than some of Van`s more atmospheric albums in the late 70`s and early to mid 80`s.
It just does for some reason, I think its because the songs on `Tupelo Honey` are just so sincere and incredibly simple.
The album begins with the most untempo tune on it, `Wild Nights`, the second song `(Straight To Your Heart) Like A Cannonball` is a wonderful piece of funky folk.
The acoustic masterpiece`Starting A New Life` is uncomplicated easy to listen to Irish soul music, if there were such a music genre.
The title track of the album is the soppiest and most melodramatic of them all, if you cant get a woman feeling a bit horny after playing her this song then chances are she never will be or your aftershave ain`t working too well.
It is the most multi-instrumental and atmospheric song of them all. Van the Man then gets back into the swing of things with `I Wanna Roo You`, either he was listening to Rolf Harris too much or his record company made him turn a root into a jumping marsupial, or maybe it was just a misprint (yeah right).
My favourite song is`When That Evening Sun Goes Down`, which is a more honky tonk jazzed up bluesy thing, what else would you expect from a blues nut like me. Women might have given me the shits for the past 20 years, but `Tupelo Honey` is an album which even brings out the die-hard romantic side in some battle weary and henpecked bachelor like me.
If you buy the album on CD, watch out for
watermarks OK. All of my Van Morrison CD`s are totally worthless as a collectors item because obviously the CD`s were very cheap and nasty to begin with.
watermarks OK. All of my Van Morrison CD`s are totally worthless as a collectors item because obviously the CD`s were very cheap and nasty to begin with.
I should point out that this album
ReplyDeletefeatured Ronnie Montrose on guitar,
Bill Church on bass and the album
producer was none other than Ted
Templeman. Montrose and Church
would go on to form half of
Montrose`s namesake band in
1973, a very diffrent style
of music indeed to the breezy
and controlled R&B tinge they
put on this Van Morrison album.
Montrose would go on to dabble
with jazz rock after the demise
of Montrose the band, but there
was never a time when he made a
instrumental contribution to a
recording that sounded like any-
thing like this. Tupelo Honey
was certainly a quirky intro-
duction to the big time for
these two heavy rockers who
would go on to record what
many think is the best 70`s
heavy metal album. Templeman
would go to Van Halen`s album
producer during the classic
David Lee Roth years, ironic-
ally he was passed up by VH
when Sammy Hagar, the lead
singer of Montrose on the
first two albums, replaced
the mercurial Roth in very
controversial circumstances.