Van Morrison, Keep It Simple.

There wasn’t anything on the telly worth watching for me last night, so I was listening to music. I haven’t played much Van Morrison recently and didn’t buy two of his last three albums, but I still think he has the finest back catalogue of anyone in popular music. I put on Keep It Simple from 2008. This is what I said about it at the time it was released.....‘My copy of Keep It Simple arrived and I eagerly opened the package. The cover of the CD was blue showing that it’s a blues influenced album like Veedon Fleece is a green showing Irish influence. The album opens with How Can A Poor Boy which I thought was a bit boring in the same way that Going Down Geneva was quite a disappointing opening track on the Back On Top album. The religious imagery reminded me a bit of They Sold Me Out on Magic Time. School Of Hard Knocks I didn't care for either although the song is livened up by the guitar of Mick Green. 

The next track Entrainment is a vast improvement. The band was stripped back to just four with Van playing ukulele, an instrument mostly associated in Britain with George Formby who partially inspired Van's song Cleaning Windows. Van said of the track, "Entrainment is when you connect with the music. Entrainment is really what I'm getting at in the music. It's kind of when you're in the present moment - you're here - with no past or future." Don't Go To Night Clubs Any More is derived from Duke Ellington's Don't Get Out Much Any More Van doffed his hat to Duke in another song in recent years when he mentioned It Don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing. Mose Allison and Georgie Fame get a mention and John Allair plays some great organ. 

Lover Come Back is much better with a sort of 50's feel to it, reminding me a bit of some of the songs on The Healing Game. The intro sounds quite haunting. Cindy Cashdollar plays on this track as opposed to Sarah Jory on steel guitar which suggests to me that the album was recorded in various locations when Van had spare time between gigs. The clickity clack of the train is reminiscent of the clicking clacking of the high heeled shoes, harking back to Astral Weeks again. The title track Keep It Simple is great. It is stripped down to keep it simple with just five players including Van on his ukelele and Geriant Watkins on accordion. When Van sings 'You gotta keep it simple and that's that' reminds me of when he used to say ‘It ain't why it just is'. I also really liked End Of The Land which featured some nice organ and guitar and is quite Dylanesque. I wish this song was longer. I thought maybe in concert he would stretch it out a bit but it never happened. Van's songs always grow and take on new life when sung live. Little Village was a good example of this. I'm still not sure if I like Song Of Home. This featured Sarah on Banjo, and the lyrics are quite banal. It is quite catchy though. No Thing is my least favourite song on the album. Soul in contrast is very positive and uplifting. 

The best is saved till last, Behind The Ritual is a Van classic. (See video below) I did wonder where Van met Sally in the alley and a friend of mine told me that Sneaking Sally Through The Alley is an Allan Toussaint song that Lee Dorsey recorded. When Van says that behind the ritual of the drinking there is the spiritual reminds me of going to the pub with my friends for happy hour and we sit out the back and talk a lot of old nonsense and blah blah blah. In the lyrics Van sings, ‘Spin and turning in the alley, spin and turning in the alley. Like a Whirling Dervish in the alley, drinking that wine’. Dervishes are part of a peaceful Islamic sect called the Sufis. You might have heard of the great Sufi poet Rumi. He wrote poems about drinking wine which are often understood as an allegory of a Sufi yearning for union with God.  Perhaps Van read Rumi and that’s what he means by ‘Behind the ritual is the spiritual’.  Whatever Van meant, I think Behind The Ritual is one of his best songs of this millennium and although Keep It Simple isn’t one of his greatest albums by any means I think it stands up very well indeed against some of his more recent offerings. 

                                        

Van Morrison Behind The Ritual. (Live at St Luke's)

Listening To Molly.

One of my New Year resolutions has already fallen by the wayside on day 2!. I don’t feel guilty about it though. I said I would go for a walk every single day to try and get fit, but yesterday afternoon the weather was so bad it was impossible to go out. Storm Henk was battering Britain. The wind was gusting at about 50MPH, so there was no way I was venturing out. I had a nice afternoon safe and sound playing music in my kitchen. I was listening to an album called Crooked Tree by Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway. I bought this album recently because some of my Facebook friends had spoken highly of Molly. Also, I saw that she is playing in Bath next week on a double bill with Tommy Emmanuel so I bought myself a ticket for that, and thought I better get myself an album to get acquainted with her music.

If you haven’t heard of Molly before, she is aged 30, an American vocalist, songwriter, banjo player, guitarist, recording artist, and teacher in the bluegrass tradition. She is noted for her flatpicking, clawhammer, and crosspicking guitar prowess. In 2017, Molly was the first woman to win the International Bluegrass Music Association's Guitar Player of the Year award. In 2018 she won the award again, along with being named the Americana Music Association's Instrumentalist of the Year. In 2023, Molly won the Best Bluegrass Album for Crooked Tree and also received a nomination for the all-genre Best New Artist award at the 65th Annual Grammy Awards. Released on April 1, 2022, it is Molly's first album for Nonesuch Records and the first to feature her band Golden Highway. The album was co-produced by Molly and dobro player Jerry Douglas and includes collaborations with Margo Price, Billy Strings, Old Crow Medicine Show, Sierra Hull, Dan Tyminski and Gillian Welch. It was preceded by the single She'll Change, which was released on November 17, 2021. (Thanks to Wikipedia for that info)

I have listened to the album a few times now and enjoyed it more with every playing. It is a grower! This would be great music for the summer outdoor festivals, it is so lively and infectious. At first I thought San Francisco Blues was my favourite song, but now I like all of it. The title track is about celebrating people’s individuality and differences. Songs like She’ll Change, Side Saddle and Goodbye Girl are concerned with female power in a male dominated world. Her band are all very gifted musicians (See video below). I’m not sure if Golden Highway will be with Molly in Bath next week, but I’m really looking forward to it. I’ll see if I can get a signed copy of her new album City of Gold and I’ll tell you all about the concert afterwards. Cheers.

Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway - Crooked Tree (Live)

Happy New Year. Muireann Bradley - Candyman.

Nick Cave Sings "A Rainy Night in Soho" at Shane MacGowan's Funeral

The Legend of Sweeney's Men.

Some new music arrived here on Monday, a compilation 2CD album from 2004 called The legend of Sweeney’s Men. I had ordered it about ten days ago and a few days later I heard the sad news that Shane Macgowan had passed away. That was a strange coincidence because one of Sweeney’s Men was Terry Woods who later became a member of Shane’s band The Pogues. Some of the Sweeney’s songs such as The Waxie’s Dargle were also part of The Pogues repertoire, so you can see that they were a very influential band. I had been meaning to listen to Sweeney’s Men for a long time for various reasons. I first heard of them through my late brother Paul who told me that on various occasions he had two of their members Johnny Moynihan and Henry McCullough play in his pub in County Mayo in the 1990s. Paul got especially friendly with Henry. I remember a famous occasion when they met up at Glastonbury 1999 after Henry played on the acoustic stage. 

Anne Briggs & Johnny Moynihan.

Another reason I wanted to learn more about this band is because of their association with Anne Briggs who apart from Sandy Denny is my favourite folk singer of all time. For several years in the 60s to the early 70s Anne was Johnny Moynihan’s girlfriend and spent several summers with the band travelling and singing around Ireland. I actually think it is a shame that Anne didn’t join the band and record with them. Johnny wrote Standing On The Shore in 1969 for the album The Tracks of Sweeney. Anne said this about the song, “This song was Johnny Moynihan’s vision. He expresses what he saw so beautifully and sadly and seems to convey this feeling of endless whiteness”. Anne recorded this song two years later for her album The Time Has Come on which Johnny played. Anne also recorded Step Right Up written by Henry. Johnny is famous for having introduced the bouzouki to Irish folk music. Anne learned how to play the bouzouki from him and recorded Living By The Water playing that instrument. There are extensive sleeve notes to this 2CD set expertly written by Colin Harper. He is a wonderful writer about the folk scene in Britain and Ireland. I have one of his books Dazzling Stranger the definitive biography of Bert Jansch. 

The sleeve notes tell us that the band got their name from Sweeney who was a mythical mad king of Ireland in the humorous classic At Swim Two Birds by Flann O’Brien who I must say is one of the funniest writers I have ever read. The original group members were Andy Irvine, Johnny Moynihan and ‘Galway’ Joe Dolan (not to be confused with the other Joe Dolan of Make Me An Island fame) They made some successful singles and then Dolan left to go to Israel. He was replaced by Terry Woods. After they recorded their first album Andy Irvine left for an extended visit to eastern Europe. He was replaced by Henry McCullough who had just been fired from his band Eire Apparent. Henry later joined Joe Cocker’s Grease Band and become the only Irish musician to play at Woodstock in 1969. He also later joined Paul McCartney in Wings. During Henry’s brief time with the Sweeney’s they went down a storm at the 1968 Cambridge Folk Festival. I wish I had been there. 

I should mention also that although he wasn’t ever a member of the band Paul Brady sometimes filled in with them on stage. Sweeney’s Men eventually dissolved, Johnny and Terry fell out with each other. Ashley Hutchings formerly of Fairport Convention tried to form a new band with them, but only Terry was recruited for the new group which became Steeleye Span. There are 41 tracks on these two CDs, so I’m not going to talk about each song and tune, but I love it, right from the very first track Old Maid In A Garret. As well as Irish music you can hear influences of English folk music, sea-faring songs and American Appalachian sounds. There are songs made famous by The Dubliners such as Black Velvet Band and McAlpines Fusiliers. I think my favourite songs on CD1 are Willy O’Winsbury which Anne also recorded, Sally Brown and Waxie’s Dargle, but I like all of them. 

The CD2 isn’t quite as traditional, with tracks like Autumn Gold, Dreams For Me, and Go By Brooks showing almost an acid-folk influence. As well as Sweeney’s Men there are tracks by the likes of The Capitol Showband, Anne Briggs (Willy O’Winsbury & Sullivan’s John), Steeleye Span, The Woods Band and Rain On The Roof which all feature various members of the band. The album ends with my favourite Andy Irvine song My Heart’s Tonight In Ireland which tells in song the story of Sweeney’s Men. I am very pleased that I bought this album and learning a lot more about the legend of Sweeney’s Men. I am sure that in years to come their legend will continue to grow. PS, since their demise there has been occasional reunions of the band. You can see a video below which is from Andy Irvine’s birthday celebrations in 2012. PPS, I found the photo of Anne & Johnny on the internet. I hope whoever owns the photo doesn't mind me using it. Cheers.