Two Nights At Bath Forum With Van Morrison.

It is now Thursday afternoon, and I’m Remembering Now the events of the past two nights in the beautiful city of Bath with Van Morrison, his band, and the street choir of Van fan friends from all over the world  that I encountered. This is what happened.  It was a sunny Springtime early evening when I got on the train for the short 20-minute journey to Bath. The green and lush countryside around Bath looks wonderful at this time of the year. I met my sister Margaret and we headed to The Cork pub on Westgate Street. There we found Theo & Dianeke, Lut, and Bart, all from Belgium. I hadn’t seen them all since Van played at Cyprus Avenue and Llangollen. It was also nice to meet Masa who had come all the way from Japan, also Mary from Devon. We sat around chatting and taking pics. Precious time was slipping away, so we all headed for The Forum. I bumped into some people I knew from Westbury and Warminster. It was also great to see John from Weston-Super-Mare who I am always seeing at local gigs. It was wonderful to meet Treve and his wife from Luton who I last saw at Westonbirt Arboretum in 2024. It was five minutes to showtime, so I told Margaret to take her seat while I nipped to the loo. While I was in there, I suddenly heard Van singing Into The Mystic. “Oh no, he has started early”, I thought to myself, and hurried to my seat in Row B.

Dianeke, Bart, Mary, Lut, Theo,Masa. 

Into The Mystic is one of the best songs ever written by anyone. What a great start to the show. The 8-piece band Van had assembled was packed with great musicians. David Hayes on bass has played with Van on and off for about 55 years. Another American Bobby Ruggerio had also returned on drums. Matt Holland on trumpet and saxophone maestro Leo Green were also making a welcome return. Regular band members Dave Keary on guitar, John McCullough on piano & keys, Sumudu Jayatilaka and Jolene O’Hara backing vocals made up this talented ensemble. Sumudu in particular impressed me tonight. She is emerging as one of Van’s best backing singers since the days of Katie Kissoon. I am not all that enamoured with the next three songs which are from Van’s recent blues album Somebody Tried To Sell Me A Bridge. They are Snatch It Back And Hold It, Play The Honky Tonks, and Madame Butterfly Blues a song which Van is keen to tell us was written by Dave Lewis from Belfast. Even if they aren’t my favourite songs, I can’t deny that they were expertly performed, Dave Keary was great as ever on guitar. Van at 80 not out still has a great voice, and he is in good humour these days, no hint of grumpiness at all, laughing and clowning with the band, and by his standards quite chatty with the audience. The next song I loved, and when the lyrics are written by WB Yeats you can’t go wrong. It is Crazy Jane On God. Van blew some mean harp on that one. 

Precious Time was next up. Some people don’t like this song, but I do. It happily bops along as Van reminds us that we’re all going to die someday. Van has recently cheered the lyrics up a bit by changing them to ‘Precious Time is holding sway’. Dave switched to pedal steel guitar on this song. Back To Writing Love Songs, The Only Love I Need Is Yours, and Once In A Lifetime Feelings are all from Van’s Remembering Now album which I consider his best album this century. However, I don’t think these are among the best songs on the album, not by a country mile. The Only Love I need Is Yours with Dave on acoustic guitar is a nice love song and the best of the three. I find some of Don Black’s lyrics quite cringeworthy. You feel sorry for the backing singers having to repeat lyrics about ice cream stands. Spare me please. Van is fifty times better as a songwriter than Don Black could ever hope to be. An extended Ain’t Gonna Moan No More was excellent, Leo on sax nearly blowing the roof off the building. This was followed by a highlight for me, a tribute to Sam Cooke and Ray Charles which was Laughing & Clowning and The Nighttime Is The Right Time. 

Sumudu.

When Sumudu joined in duetting with Van she was astoundingly great. Her contribution brought huge spontaneous warm applause from the Bath audience. These Dreams Of You from the Moondance album was a welcome addition to the setlist which I furtively managed to film, successfully dodging the eagle-eyed security people. Down To Joy from the Belfast film was great as ever. Real Real Gone was another highlight which Van took to the bridge by segueing into You Send Me, and I am sure I heard a snippet of Wonderful World in there as well. Van then slung on his electric guitar for a modern Van classic which is Green Rocky Road from his Moving On Skiffle album. It was great with Van adding new words at the end with ‘Spinning & turning, living & learning’. The audience loved Moondance, but I’ve heard it too often. I knew the show was coming to an end when Van sang the predictable Help Me. The whole audience were on their feet for Gloria. Van left the stage to make a sharp exit from the building as the band played on. By the time they stopped playing I was already outside on the pavement. When all our friends emerged we agreed it had been a very enjoyable concert with Leo and Sumudu the best of the band. Me, Margaret, John, and Mary had a quick last drink in the Royal Hotel bar and then Margaret and me caught the 10.40 train home. What a great night it had been.

The next afternoon it was sunny, but very windy. I thought it was going to blow my hat off. I was tired as well and didn’t fancy the 20 minutes’ walk to the train station. Luckily a bus came along and I hopped on it. I was in Bath by 5.00 and met Fumiko in Café Nero, and then we walked to The Cork. Theo, Dianeke, and Lut were already there, and It was nice to see Peter and Kathryn and their family. Then Jane from Oxford strolled in. It’s always a pleasure to see Jane. Finally, Miquel from sunny Spain arrived with a friend of his. I think I hadn’t seen Miquel since Van played at the Eden Project quite a few years ago. Time hurried on and we made our way to The Forum. In the queue I met an American lady called Hadley who gave me a nice message from Stu & Michelle in San Diego. Jane took my picture by the Van poster in the window. I tried to take one of her, but it never came out, sorry Jane. Inside the Forum it was great to see Gaynor and her friend from Cardiff. I hadn’t seen them since I met them by chance in Cyprus Avenue 11 years ago. I made sure I was in my seat in Row A before 8.00 tonight. 

Dianeke, Lut, Jane.

I can’t be bothered to tell you all the songs from night 2, because it was pretty much the same songs as before, but in a different order.  I’ll just tell you about the three different songs in the setlist. The opening song was Dweller On The Threshold from 1982’s Beautiful Vision. Matt deserves a mention for his trumpet playing on this song. Little Village was a highlight of night 2. It’s a song that was underrated when first released, but in live performance is epic with Van adlibbing about coming from the island of saints, and the church of Saul. It was almost impossible to take photos or film on night 2. The security were telling lots of people to put their cameras away, so towards the end of the show I moved to the back of the hall to try and get some pics. I filmed about a minute of Into The Mystic, but it wasn’t very good. Early In The Morning was another change to the night before. It’s not a favourite song, but live it gives the band a chance to show their skills. After the show I think we all agreed that Van and the band performed brilliantly, but it didn’t quite reach the heights of night 1 because Sumudu didn’t get the chance to exercise her tonsils as much as the night before. Anyway, we all said goodbye and went our separate ways. I hope we meet up again before too long. After a well-deserved last pint of cider, I caught the 10.40 train and that was that. Thank you Van for two great nights in Bath, and don't leave it so long before returning!. 

THE END.

The Beautiful City Of Bath.