Christy Moore at Glastonbury 2004

On YouTube just now I was watching Christy Moore singing Missing You at Glastonbury 2004. It brought back some good memories because me and Kim were there, right down at the front, but I couldn't spot us. I shared the video to this blog page if you want to see it. Also, I dug out this story I wrote at the time.....

It was time to make our way to the Pyramid Stage to see one of my personal favourites Christy Moore. We got there good and early to get right at the front. Before Christy played The Bishop of Bath & Wells came on stage and gave a short speech which was well received. He reminded the audience that during the three days of the festival 90,000 children will have died worldwide because of lack of the basic things we take for granted and he urged the audience to support the charities that the festival supports.  What many people forget, that Glastonbury is a fundraiser. Each year it gives millions to groups such as Oxfam, Greenpeace, Water Aid, Amnesty International and many others. 

I had seen Christy three times before at this festival. The previous time was 1993 when he came on before Lenny Kravitz and The Kinks. On that occasion when he sang Welcome To The Cabaret  Christy said something like, "Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming to see Lenny Kravitz and The Kinks and Christy Moore, I've never heard of him before!". Christy has always been a big supporter of the festival so it was great to see him back on the Pyramid Stage at 4.00 Sunday afternoon. He hadn't enjoyed the best of health in recent years, but seemed fighting fit again now. It was also great to see him arrive on stage with great support from Declan Sinnott and Donal Lunny. We were in for a great show. Christy began with Before The Deluge, a Jackson Browne song that Christy has made his own. I wondered why he chose that song to open? Had he gotten word backstage about the storm brewing? He followed that with North And South Of The River, a very moving song about Northern Ireland. This set the tone for the show with Christy opting for songs with a strong political message rather than love songs or the whimsical humorous songs for which he is noted.  I wasn't taking notes so can't remember every song that Christy sang, but he did the following for sure, After The Deluge, North And South Of The River, Black Is The Colour (Christy does requests even at Glasto), Missing You, Viva La Quinte Brigada (Awesome, My Favourite), Burning Times, City Of Chicago, Go Move Shift, Hiroshima/Nagasaki Russian Roulette, and Yellow Triangle.

 A few minutes into the set it began to rain and got heavier until it became a downpour, the crowd stayed though even though they were drenched which is a huge sign of the affection the audience had for Christy. I think the rain even made him more determined to entertain the crowd. “I know it’s hard but thanks for staying with us, you created a great vibe to work off," Said Christy. We all knew what the finish would be. It was of course Lisdoonvarna which was superb, and I always like it when Christy name checks my other hero Van Morrison. The song evolved into I'll Tell me Ma and the crowd danced in the mud. All three of them took a bow and walked off in triumph. What a show. As we left John C Scott from the official Glastonbury Website took our photo. I looked like a drowned rat. we went back to the tent. where we found a huge pool of water in it because I had not done the zip up properly. I made a decision. "Shall we go home?", I said to Kim.  "Don't you want to see James Brown?". Neither of us were that fussed about seeing the Godfather of Soul, so we put our possessions in a couple of bags and walked away, leaving our little faithful little tent in a rubbish bin.

 It had done a good job for four years, but it was knackered and caked in mud. I wouldn’t do that these days, I would take it home even if I didn’t want it any more. Love The Farm, Leave No Trace!. We got the bus to Castle Cary and the train and were home about fifty minutes after leaving the site. That evening I went to the pub and watched the Czech Republic play Denmark in the football. then watched about two hours of Glasto on the telly. Bonnie Raitt sounded great and Morrissey and we began to regret coming home early. I felt that we had cheated. That was the only time I have come home from Glasto before Monday. The next day I washed my wellies with a hosepipe in the garden because they were covered in mud and a little bit of Worthy farm became part of our back garden.

Me & Kim soaked after watching Christy Moore. Glastonbury 2004

Christy Moore - Missing You, at Glastonbury 2004

No Guru, No Method, No Teacher by Van Morrison.

I will not be going out today. I am listening to one of my favourite Van Morrison albums and updating, revising, and hopefully improving what I said about it a long time ago…..The opening words of the novel The Go Between by L.P. Hartley are, The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there. I think Van Morrison might have read The Go Between because in the opening song on No Guru, No Method, No Teacher Van sings, I've been living in another country that operates along entirely different lines. This album is a journey through the past for Van. Similarities can be seen between this album and Astral Weeks, not in mood but in imagery and lyrics. Words and phrases used in both albums such as gardens misty wet with rain, childlike visions, kissed my eyes, chariots, mansions all make one wonder if this album is Astral Weeks revisited. In Astral Weeks Van hints at reincarnation and this is another theme in No Guru.

I am almost certain Van took the album title from the words of Jiddu Krishnamurti who often used a similar expression in his talks and writings. Van was very influenced by Krishnamurti during the 80's. This is what Van said in an interview- Although I came across and read Krishnamurti's books in the early 1970s, I only heard him speak once, at Masonic Hall in San Francisco. As far back as I can remember I have been influenced by religious and philosophical works and I had a big change in my state of mind just prior to discovering Krishnamurti's books. His philosophy corresponded to what I myself was going through on an inward level. I feel the meaning of Krishnamurti for our time is that one has to think for oneself and not be swayed by any outside religious or spiritual authorities.

I had the good fortune to see Krishnamurti myself in 1983. A friend of mine called Kevin had read a lot of his writings and lent me several books. We heard that Krishnamurti was giving a series of talks at Brockwood Park near Winchester, so me, Kev, and another friend Wally went along to see him. Krishnamurti was then an old man of about 88, but his mind was as sharp as a razor blade. I felt privileged to have seen him because he died only three years later. I forgot, or did not understand most of what he said that day, but a seed had been planted because I am still interested in his teachings to this day. What he taught is not far removed from what Eckhart Tolle teaches in the present day.  Another memory of that visit was an arboretum with trees from all over the world, including giant redwood trees from California. I would like to return one day to Brockwood Park.

J Krishnamurti.

The opening track Got To Go Back is one of Van's best songs in my opinion. The words When I was a boy back in Orangefield I used to look out my classroom and dream remind me of myself, because I was a daydreamer and still am in many ways. Van says, Oh that love that was within me, you know it carried me through, well it lifted me up and it filled me. When Van was a child he had mystical experiences and visions and in adulthood his interest in spirituality was a search to find where this mysticism came from. That is why he had to go back for the healing because he believed in the healing power of music. As with Astral Weeks this album is also a love story as seen in Oh The Warm Feeling.  The lyrics are quite simple but evoke an emotion of spirituality and oneness. The contributions of the musicians on this album should not be overlooked. Richie Buckley's saxophone and Bianca Thornton's backing vocals are particularly impressive. Also, I have always liked Kate St John’s contributions to Van’s albums on oboe and cor anglais

Foreign Window makes me wonder if he is referring to  Dylan with the line You were singing about Rimbaud because Dylan mentioned Rimbaud on his Blood On The Tracks album. Van and Bob once famously sang this song together on a hill overlooking Athens. Reincarnation or enlightenment is hinted at here with the words And if you get it right this time, You don't have to come back again, And if you get it right this time, There's no need to explain. In A Town Called Paradise he complains about copycats ripping off his songs, but Van has done plenty of ripping off himself. In Cyprus Avenue for example he lifts great stretches of All Shook Up by Elvis. It is not one of my favourite songs.

In The Garden is one of Van's crowning achievements. The words say: The light of God was shinin' on your countenance divine, And you were a violet colour as you sat beside your father and your mother in the garden. I find that interesting because I have heard that people all have auras which are different colours, and some enlightened beings can see other people’s auras. Violet is also the name of Van's mother, but I don’t think that has any significance. In The Garden is the best song I have ever seen Van perform live. That was in the winter of 94 in the Great Hall at Exeter University. Tir Na Nog is a mythical Irish kingdom and Van might have been inspired to write it by reading the work of W.B. Yeats. The same could also be said about Here Comes The Knight which quotes the words on Yeats grave-Cast a cold eye on life, on death. Horseman pass by!  Thanks For The Information is possibly my least favourite song on this album. To me, the line When he's breaking through to a new level of consciousness is reminiscent of The Doors with Break on through to the other side. Reaching a new level of consciousness could be another example of the influence of Krishnamurti. I have read somewhere that the original title of One Irish Rover was One Roman Soldier which would have given the song an entirely different meaning.  The album ends with Ivory Tower which was released as a single. I remember him singing it on the Terry Wogan television show.

To my ears the 1980s were a golden age of Van Morrison music and despite me being indifferent to a couple of the songs I think No Guru, No Method, No Teacher is possibly his greatest album of that decade and In The Garden and Got To Go Back are among the finest songs of his long career. 

Wisdom Of Krishnamurti.

Van Morrison & Literature.

The big news today in the Van Morrison fan world is that Van has a new double album imaginatively titled Latest Record Project: Volume 1 coming out in May. A new album by Van is always something to look forward to. As well as listening to the music, I like poring over the lyrics looking for meanings in them. One thing I have noticed over the years is how well-read Van is. His lyrics are strewn with literary references. Thinking about that today reminded me of a piece that I wrote ages ago and I thought I should revisit it, update it, and hopefully improve it. This is it. 

I bought a book on eBay called The Dweller On The Threshold by Robert Hichens. It was published in 1909. I bought it because it had the same title as a song by Van Morrison from his 1982 album Beautiful Vision and I thought that it might help towards my understanding of Van's music. I thought this book might be where Van got the inspiration for his song from, but I have found out since that the expression Dweller On The Threshold was first used in 1842 in a book by Edward Bulwer-Llyton called Zanoni which was his interpretation of an ancient Rosicrucian manuscript. The Dweller is an invisible and possibly malevolent spirit that attaches itself to a human being. It is also mentioned in books by Rudolf Steiner and Madame Blavatsky who was a big influence on Van in the 1980's. Madame Blavatsky who was a theosophist said that the Dweller On The Threshold was separated from the angel of the presence by the burning ground, so I think we can see where Van got his song The Burning Ground from.

All this got me wondering how many more songs of Van are also the titles of books, and I was surprised to find that there are quite a few. Haunts Of Ancient Peace is the opening track on the Common One album and it is also the title of a book by Alfred Austin published in 1902. Alfred Austin was appointed Poet Laureate following the death of Lord Tennyson. I am not sure if Van read the book or just liked the title.

 Avalon Of The Heart from the Enlightenment album is also a book by Dion Fortune which was first published in 1934. I am sure that Van read this book because of his huge interest in Glastonbury and Avalon which is the New Jerusalem. Dion Fortune described Glastonbury as one of the green roads to the soul and I’m sure Van was inspired to write much of his music after visiting the Abbey, The Chalice Well and The Tor. Avalon was the source of some of Van's greatest work in the 1980's. Dion Fortune died in 1946 and she is buried in Glastonbury. I have previously written a story on this blog page about the time I visited her grave. 

Another book that I am quite confident that Van has read is Don't Push The River (It Flows By Itself) by Barry Stevens. I am sure it inspired his song You Don't Pull No Punches, But You Don't Push The River from the Veedon Fleece album of 1974. This album is full of literary references such as Poe, Wilde and Thoreau, and Van has acknowledged that this particular track was influenced by his reading of Gestalt therapy. The author of the book Barry Stevens was a gestalt therapist who also investigated the writings of Jiddu Krishnamurti another huge influence on Van and gave Van the title of his No Guru, No Method, No Teacher album. It is in the lyrics of this song that Van first mentions William Blake whose name occurs many more times in Van's subsequent career. There is a book called A New Kind Of Man which is a biography of Blake by Michael Davis. I wonder if Van has read it because it is the title of one of his songs on the Sense Of Wonder album. Ancient of Days on the same album is taken from a painting by Blake.

Van has said that his song Fire In The Belly from his album The Healing Game was inspired by the book of the same name by Sam Keen. He is an American writer, professor and philosopher who has written many books on life, love and being a man in modern society. Van has also definitely read Cloud Hidden Whereabouts Unknown by Alan Watts because he called A song on Poetic Champions Compose Alan Watts Blues and uses the book title freely in the lyrics of the song.

Green Mansions is the best-known novel by W.H. Hudson published in 1904.It was made into a film in 1959 starring Audrey Hepburn and Anthony Perkins and flopped at the box-office. It is also the title of one of the lesser-known songs on Van’s Hymns To The Silence album. I don't know if Van has read the book or seen the film but he got the title from somewhere. Whilst on the subject of film there is a film called Cold Wind In August. made in 1961 from a novel by Burton Wohl starring Lola Albright and also the title of a song on A Period Of Transition.

One of my favourite songs on the Into The Music album is Angelou. I have never heard of anyone with that first name. I have sometimes wondered if Van got it from the famous author Maya Angelou. The Beat Generation writers have always been an influence on Van, especially Jack Kerouac who he has mentioned more than once in his lyrics. More recently on his 2016 album Keep Me Singing in the song In Tiburon he says, ‘Across the bay in San Francisco, Where city lights and Ferlinghetti stay, North Beach alleyways and cafés, Kerouac and Ginsberg, Gregory Corso and Neal Cassady all held sway’.

The song Meaning Of Loneliness on What’s Wrong With This Picture? mentions Dante Sartre, Camus, Nietzsche and Hesse. This is equaled by Rave On John Donne which along with the metaphysical poet of the title also name-checks Walt Whitman, Omar Khayyam, Kahlil Gibran, and W.B. Yeats. Let's not forget Lord Byron and Rimbaud in the song Foreign Window and Rimbaud also provides the title for one of Van's greatest songs Tore Down A La Rimbaud. I am sure I could find even more literary names if I really searched. I think with all this name-dropping Van is encouraging the listener to check these people out. It is the same with his musical influences who he often draws our attention to in his lyrics.  If they did a course at a University in Van Morrison studies, I think any student would receive a first-rate education.

Beat Writers, Bob Donlon, Neal Cassady, Allen Ginsberg, Robert La Vigne and Lawrence Ferlinghetti 

 

An Enjoyable Discussion.

I watched an online event tonight. It was organised by The Guardian and introduced by the literary journalist Alex Clark who was in discussion with the writer and Nobel Prize laureate Kazuo Ishiguro whose new novel Klara and the Sun was published today. There were also questions from guest celebrities such as writers Daisy Johnson, Bernardine Evaristo, and David Mitchell, and actress Emma Thompson who starred in the film adaption of The Remains Of The Day. I thought she asked a particularly good question when she asked if Kazuo thought that films can ever do the original book justice. He replied that writing books and making films are completely different art forms, so film makers should not try and replicate the book exactly but create something entirely new.

Music is obviously especially important to Kazuo Ishiguro and he revealed that in his youth he hoped to be a singer-songwriter and wrote about a hundred songs. The song writing helped when he started writing short stories in showing him the discipline of what words to leave out. He is a fan of Bob Dylan and said that after the success of Remains Of The Day he felt he had to move on like Dylan did and do something completely different, such as when Dylan went electric and got booed by the audience. He also mentioned Stanley Kubrick as another example of someone who always did something different.

There was one awkward moment when Alex Clark described his book The Unconsoled as ‘bonkers’. He was not offended though and took it as praise, with his usual good humour. He talked very seriously about the effect of the pandemic, also the world situation in the last year with people needing scientific truth to find a way out and develop vaccines whilst at the same time half the voters in America believing that the election was stolen from Trump. He questioned what writers like himself are contributing by putting forward emotional truths when scientific truth seems more important. He also talked about the amnesia of history where painful truths about our past are conveniently forgotten. This was brought to the fore last year by such things as the killing of George Floyd, the Black Lives Matter movement and the pulling down of statues of slave traders.

The way he spoke so intelligently made me think that he would have made a great politician, but on reflection I think he is making a much better contribution to society as a writer. If you look back in history, it is writers and artists who have changed the world in a much more beneficial way than politicians. Take the Renaissance for instance. The pen is definitely mightier than the sword. After this most enjoyable discussion I am eagerly looking forward to reading Klara And The Sun in the very near future.

 

The Angry Young Them.

Today I thought I would revisit the very first album which Van Morrison made which is called The Angry Young Them from 1965 when he was in the group called Them. The title of the album is a play on words of  The Angry Young Men, a term applied to a group of working class British writers and playwrights of the late 50's and early sixties. They included such people as John Osbourne who wrote Look Back In Anger, Harold Pinter, John Braine, Alan Sillitoe, Arnold Wesker, Colin Wilson,and others.  Shelagh Delaney who wrote A Taste Of Honey is also associated with these writers. I think Them's manager Philip Solomon chose that name for the album to give Them a gritty hard image. I don't think they were particularly angry in a political sense but they could be quite confrontational in interviews.

The first song is Mystic Eyes. It must have been quite an experience for music fans at the Maritime Hotel in Belfast to have seen this song performed live. I think originally it was seven minutes long and evolved from a jam session in the studio with Van making the words up on the spur of the moment. The word mystic was to figure large in his subsequent career. The next track If You And I Could Be As Two opens with Van's spoken voice talking about autumn leaves being on the ground. This is another image that would crop up again much later in his career. Then it is Little Girl which is about watching a school girl on her way to school, which might not be acceptable these days, but you have to remember that Van was only a teenager himself when he wrote this song. It features the late great Pete Bardens on keyboards. He would re-emerge 13 years later on Vans Wavelength album. Pete was the only member of Them apart from Van to achieve huge success when he formed the band Camel and made the Snowgoose album. Just A Little Bit features  saxophone and keyboards and throaty vocals by Van. It was written by Rosco Gordon in 1959. I Gave My Love A Diamond' written by Bert Berns and Wes Farrell is next and Bert  played a major part in Vans future career. This is a great example of the British R & B sound of the sixties. Gloria is next, one of the greatest rock songs ever written. It brings Van's concerts to a rousing finale to this very day. You Just Can't Win is penned by Van and mentions his London haunts such as Camden Town and the Tottenham Court Road.

Go On Home Baby is another Berns/Farrell composition and Van sounds very much like Mick Jagger.  Don't Look Back  is a John Lee Hooker song that Van would continue to perform later in his career. I Like It Like That is a Van song and one of his lesser ones from this era in my opinion. I'm Gonna Dress In Black follows and this has quite an Animals sound to me. The keyboards remind me of Alan Price on House Of The Rising Sun. According to Wikipedia it was written by Gillon and Howe. I don't think i have heard the song by anybody else so  assume it is a Them original. Bright Lights/Big City was written by Jimmy Reed in 1961 and was also recorded by The Animals. My Little Baby' is the third Berns/Farrell song on the album. Get Your Kicks On Route 66 brings the album to a close.This Bobby Troup song was performed by nearly every band in the 60's,most famously by the Stones and Van still sings it occasionally when he is in the mood.

I think it is a shame that Them never made a live album when these songs could have been really stretched out and displayed the raw energy of this band. A year later Van would leave Them and begin his solo career. Who would have thought only three short years after this album came out that Van would enter a New York recording studio to make one the greatest albums of all time Astral Weeks.