Van Morrison @ Theater at MSG in Feb. 2009 (more by Eric M. Townsend)

But over the years, [Astral Weeks] kept coming up. It was a perennial favorite in polls with titles like "What is the greatest album of all time?" On the other hand, Morrison himself had been content to forget the album ever happened.

"It was suppressed in my memory," Morrison says. "As far as I was concerned, it just didn't exist."

Now, the album has an almost mythological status in pop culture. Everyone from Glen Hansard to Johnny Depp has talked about how it changed their lives.

"I don't know what to say because it didn't change my life," says Morrison. "I don't know what to make of [the mythology]. It's like any sort of art form -- it's whatever it means to you."

Morrison's cynicism goes further.

"Rock is a brainwash -- I think that's where your mythology goes back to," Morrison says. "It's the most pretentious area in music. It's got singers who don't really sing." [NPR]

Van Morrison has a few more 'Astral Weeks' shows lined up for this fall. But when he comes to NYC's Theater at Madison Square Garden, one of the NYC venues he played 'Astral Weeks' at earlier this year, on October 25th, he'll be presenting "An Evening With Van Morrison." Tickets for that show are on sale now.

All tour dates, with a video of Morrison being interviewed by Time about the Astral Weeks shows, below...

Continue reading "Van Morrison playing 'Astral Weeks' again, but not at the NYC show (which is on sale now) "

On one evening last year, Van Morrison finally got around to revisiting the album that many consider his masterpiece, "Astral Weeks."

This week, a recording of that performance - "Astral Weeks: Live at the Hollywood Bowl" (Listen to the Lion/EMI) - was released. It presents a singer who sounds more engaged, more passionate than he has been about anything in years.

No work in Morrison's canon - or in the rock lexicon, for that matter - sounds quite like "Astral Weeks." Forty-one years after its release it still occupies its own world. [Popmatters]

Van Morrison has doubled the amount of times he'll be performing "Astral Weeks" in NYC over the course of the next month. As previously announced, he'll be playing the classic album from start to finish at the Theater at Madison Square Garden on February 27th and 28th. Now he's added March 3rd and 4th at the Beacon Theater too. Tickets for the new shows are on sale TODAY (2/13) @ 9:00 AM.

Speaking of today and the Beacon Theater, tonight's Paul Simon show marks the official reopening of the revamped venue. AP says, "The renovation includes a complete reworking of the Beacon's electrical system, as well as new draperies with gold tassels. A canvas mural in the neoclassical rotunda and the main box office have been restored." The NY Times has a cool panorama view of what it looks like.

Leonard Cohen also has a show coming up there.

"Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl" videos below...

Continue reading "Beacon Theater reopening, Van Morrison adds 2 NYC shows "

His first album for Warner Bros. Records was Astral Weeks (which he had already performed in several clubs around Boston), a mystical song cycle, considered by many to be his best work. Morrison has said, "When Astral Weeks came out, I was starving, literally." Released in 1968, the album achieved critical acclaim, but it originally received an indifferent response from the public. To this day, it remains in an unclassifiable music genre and has been described variously as hypnotic, meditative, and as possessing a unique musical power. It has been compared to French Impressionism and mystical Celtic poetry. A 2004 Rolling Stone magazine review begins with the words: "This is music of such enigmatic beauty that thirty-five years after its release, Astral Weeks still defies easy, admiring description." Alan Light would later describe Astral Weeks as "like nothing he had done previously--and really, nothing anyone had done previously. Morrison sings of lost love, death, and nostalgia for childhood in the Celtic soul that would become his signature." In 1979, prominent and influential journalist Lester Bangs wrote one of the best-known reviews in rock music history in Stranded, describing the effect that Astral Weeks had on his life. It has often been placed on the most authoritative lists of best albums of all time. In the 1995 MOJO list of 100 Best Albums, it was listed as number two and was number nineteen on the Rolling Stone magazine's The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003. [Wikipedia]

Tickets are on sale for the two Van Morrison "Astral Weeks" shows @ MSG Theater.

Multi-award winning soul singer and musical legend Van Morrison is set to release "Astral Weeks: Live at the Hollywood Bowl," an in-concert reworking of his historic 1968 gold-certified solo album. Recorded live over two nights at the Hollywood Bowl this past Nov. 7 and 8, the album marks the premiere release on Mr. Morrison's new EMI-distributed label, Listen to the Lion Records. "Astral Weeks: Live at the Hollywood Bowl" arrives in stores Feb. 10, 2009. A double-vinyl edition with three bonus tracks (including a live version of "Gloria") arrives in stores the same day.

The concerts marked the first time Mr. Morrison ever performed "Astral Weeks" in one complete concert set. Joining him was an orchestral string section and a band composed of world-class musicians, some of whom played with Van on the original "Astral Weeks" sessions 40 years ago. Tracks on the CD include: "Astral Weeks/I Believe I've Transcended," "Beside You," "Slim Slow Slider/ I Start Breaking Down," "Sweet Thing," "The Way Young Lovers Do," "Cyprus Avenue / You Came Walking Down," "Ballerina," "Madame George" and two bonus tracks, "Listen to the Lion / The Lion Speaks" and "Common One."

The Hollywood Bowl concerts gave me a welcome opportunity to perform these songs the way I originally intended them to be," says Mr. Morrison, who amazingly held only one rehearsal prior to the concerts. "There are certain dynamics you can get in live recordings that you just cannot get in a studio recording. I love listening to live recordings. You get the whole thing right there, unabridged, raw and in the moment. There was a distinct alchemy happening on that stage in Hollywood. I felt it."....

....Both Bowl shows were filmed in high-definition, and will later be available as a commercial DVD concert film. Due to overwhelming demand, Mr. Morrison will perform "Astral Weeks" again, in show at the Theater at New York's Madison Square Garden, on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 27 & 28. Accompanied by two different bands, Mr. Morrison will play two sets per show: one of "Astral Weeks" cover to cover, the other of rarely played Van Morrison classics. He may even pull out rare gems "TB Sheets," "Mystic Eyes," "Who Drove the Red Sports Car" and "Baby Please Don't Go."

Tickets for both NYC shows go on Am Ex presale this Sunday at 10AM.

Tickets go on Am Ex presale one week later for the two Paul Simon shows at Beacon Theatre.