# Deep Tracks - Van Morrison - "Moondance"



## Guest (Sep 24, 2018)

View attachment 108252


Please *choose up to seven selections* for this particular poll.

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Next up is - Van Morrison - "Moondance"

Sir George Ivan Morrison OBE (born 31 August 1945) is a Northern Irish singer-songwriter, instrumentalist and record producer.

His professional career began as a teenager in the late 1950s playing a variety of instruments including guitar, harmonica, keyboards and saxophone for various Irish showbands, covering the popular hits of that time. Van Morrison rose to prominence in the mid-1960s as the lead singer of the Northern Irish R&B band Them, with whom he recorded the garage band classic "Gloria".

His solo career began under the pop-hit oriented guidance of Bert Berns with the release of the hit single "Brown Eyed Girl" in 1967. After Berns's death, Warner Bros. Records bought out his contract and allowed him three sessions to record Astral Weeks (1968). Though this album gradually garnered high praise, it was initially a poor seller.

Moondance (1970) established Morrison as a major artist, and he built on his reputation throughout the 1970s with a series of acclaimed albums and live performances.

Much of Morrison's music is structured around the conventions of soul music and R&B, such as the popular singles "Brown Eyed Girl", "Jackie Wilson Said (I'm in Heaven When You Smile)", "Domino" and "Wild Night".

An equal part of his catalogue consists of lengthy, loosely connected, spiritually inspired musical journeys that show the influence of Celtic tradition, jazz and stream-of-consciousness narrative, such as the album "Astral Weeks" and the lesser known "Veedon Fleece" and "Common One". The two strains together are sometimes referred to as "Celtic soul".

He has received two Grammy Awards, the 1994 Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music, the 2017 Americana Music Lifetime Achievement Award for Songwriting and has been inducted into both the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

In 2016, he was knighted for services to the music industry and to tourism in Northern Ireland.

He is known by the nickname Van the Man to his fans.

"Moondance" is the 1970 third studio album by Morrison. After the commercial failure of 1968's "Astral Weeks" album, Morrison and his wife moved to upstate New York and began writing songs for Moondance. There, he met the musicians he would record the album with at New York City's A & R Studios in 1969.

Morrison abandoned the abstract folk jazz compositions of "Astral Weeks" in favor of more formally composed songs on "Moondance", which he wrote and produced entirely himself. Its lively rhythm and blues/rock music was the style he would become most known for in his career. The music incorporated soul, jazz, pop, and Irish folk sounds into songs about finding spiritual renewal and redemption in worldly matters such as nature, music, romantic love, and self-affirmation.

"Moondance" was first released by Warner Bros. Records on 27 January 1970 to critical and commercial success. It helped establish Morrison as a major artist in popular music, while several of its songs became staples on FM radio in the early 1970s. "Moondance" has since been cited by critics as one of the greatest albums of all time.

Moondance was released by Warner Bros. on 27 January 1970 in the United Kingdom and on 28 February 1970 in the United States, receiving immediate acclaim from critics.

In a contemporary review for The Village Voice, Robert Christgau claimed that Morrison had finally fulfilled his artistic potential: "Forget Astral Weeks-this is a brilliant, catchy, poetic, and completely successful LP."

Greil Marcus and Lester Bangs jointly reviewed the album in Rolling Stone, hailing it as a work of "musical invention and lyrical confidence; the strong moods of 'Into the Mystic' and the fine, epic brilliance of 'Caravan' will carry it past many good records we'll forget in the next few years."

Fellow Rolling Stone critic Jon Landau found the singer's vocals overwhelming: "Things fell into place so perfectly I wished there was more room to breathe. Morrison has a great voice and on "Moondance" he found a home for it."

Ralph J. Gleason from the San Francisco Chronicle also wrote of Morrison's singing as a focal point of praise: "He wails as the jazz musicians speak of wailing, as the gypsies, as the Gaels and the old folks in every culture speak of it. He gets a quality of intensity in that wail which really hooks your mind, carries you along with his voice as it rises and falls in long, soaring lines."

In the years following the original release, "Moondance" was frequently ranked as one of the greatest albums ever.

According to Acclaimed Music, it is the 102nd most prominently ranked record on critics' all-time lists.

In 1978, it was voted the 22nd best album of all time in Paul Gambaccini's poll of 50 prominent American and English rock critics. Christgau, one of the critics polled, named it the 7th best album of the 1970s in The Village Voice the following year.

In a retrospective review, Nick Butler from Sputnikmusic considered Moondance to be the peak of Morrison's career and "maybe of non-American soul in general", while Spin deemed it "the great white soul album" in an essay accompanying the magazine's 1989 list of the all-time 25 greatest albums, on which Moondance was ranked 21st.

In 1999, the album was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, and in 2003, it was placed at number 65 on Rolling Stone's list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

It was on Time magazine's 2006 list of the "All-TIME 100 Albums". The following year, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame named Moondance one of their "Definitive 200" albums, ranking it 72nd.


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## Guest (Sep 24, 2018)

"*And It Stoned Me*" -






"*Moondance*" -






"*Crazy Love*" -






"*Caravan*" -






"*Into The Mystic*" -






"*Come Running*" -






"*These Dreams Of You*" -






"*Brand New Day*" -






"*Everyone*" -






"*Glad Tidings*" -


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## jim prideaux (May 30, 2013)

alright....I pick out those track that I consider to be the 'best' on one of the most significant albums of my 'listening career' and then ponder just what to write. There have been other significant albums on here where I have commented (sometimes at length)but in this instance when I stop and think I can only conclude that it would just be too specific to me......however I will always remain indebted to Van if for nothing other than Caravan, a song which in numerous guises is something that I have returned to time and time again throughout my life, in good times and bad.

( I also recall reading in y teens in one weekly publication that 'Into the mystic' is 'perfect'....who am I to argue?)


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## Belowpar (Jan 14, 2015)

jim prideaux said:


> alright....I pick out those track that I consider to be the 'best' on one of the most significant albums of my 'listening career' and then ponder just what to write. There have been other significant albums on here where I have commented (sometimes at length)but in this instance when I stop and think I can only conclude that it would just be too specific to me......however I will always remain indebted to Van if for nothing other than Caravan, a song which in numerous guises is something that I have returned to time and time again throughout my life, in good times and bad.
> 
> ( I also recall reading in y teens in one weekly publication that 'Into the mystic' is 'perfect'....who am I to argue?)


Yes a week has passed and I can't add anything. I just love everything about this album too much.

And it stoned me,,,resonates. My childhood was in NI and later I grew to love Jazz. This synthesis somehow works perfectly.

Just too personal.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

I can't. Along with "The Band" this is one of my very few perfect pop/rock albums.


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## jim prideaux (May 30, 2013)

reassuring that the previous two posts echo my somewhat 'emotional' post earlier....was starting to think it is just me!


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## Guest (Oct 7, 2018)

Belowpar said:


> Yes a week has passed and I can't add anything. I just love everything about this album too much.
> 
> And it stoned me,,,resonates. My childhood was in NI and later I grew to love Jazz. This synthesis somehow works perfectly.
> 
> Just too personal.





jegreenwood said:


> I can't. Along with "The Band" this is one of my very few perfect pop/rock albums.





jim prideaux said:


> reassuring that the previous two posts echo my somewhat 'emotional' post earlier....was starting to think it is just me!


By the power invested in me as the thread creator I hereby allow the above named to vote upon this poll with no limitations on the number of selections allowed and thus they may choose all that they wish...

In the future, if something means that much to some one, just let me know, eh?

- Syd


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Great album but I prefer the acoustic introspection of _Astral Weeks_.


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