Van Morrison Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

Music, January 1971: All Things Must Pass

Atlantic’s Ahmet Ertegun recognized that the future of music was likely to be both album shaped and white in color.

Random music recollections based on the book Never A Dull Moment.

The Beatles had broken up but there was a Fab on the top of the charts. All Things Must Pass spent the first seven weeks of 1971 at #1 in the US, though, as a double album, or triple, if you insist on counting the jam, it was twice the price of a standard LP. The title song was the theme of my high school senior prom. I loved the All Things Must Pass album, but was sad that the box the albums came in was too flimsy, and fairly quickly.

Whereas John Lennon’s Plastic Ono Band album was more difficult for me to grasp at first, with the primal screaming, though I did make it a part of my limited playlist at college that fall.

I was disheartened by the sometimes public sniping among the former Beatles, such as John’s towards George’s album, which was doing much better commercially than his. But because of a partnership agreement just before Brian Epstein’s death, they were joined at the hip. Harrison’s success was good for Lennon’s pocket too. So Paul could not leave the label as he wanted to do.

The leader of a Jersey cover band called Steel Mill made a trip to California and heard Van Morrison’s His Band and Street Choir. That album was one of my favorites, with Blue Money and Domino. That singer/guitarist, BTW, was Bruce Springsteen.

“Yes, we’re one of a number of long-haired groups who had been picked up in a sweep conducted by Atlantic’s Ahmet Ertegun when he recognized that the future was likely to be both album shaped and white in color. Ertegun had used his roots music calling card to sign Crosby, Stills & Nash; Iron Butterfly; Cream; and many other groups he really didn’t pretend to understand.” I did note that a lot of my favorite music of the period, from Sam & Dave and Roberta Flack and the (Young) Rascals to Led Zeppelin, was on the label.

The Yes Album did well, especially in head shops of the UK the first quarter of the year. It became another listening staple in my freshman year of college. So was Led Zeppelin III, which actually was #1 for 4 weeks in the last quarter of 1970.

Listen to:

Lord If I Ever Needed Someone – Van Morrison
Every Little Thing – Yes
What Is Life – George Harrison
Give Me Some Truth – John Lennon
I Hear You Knocking – Dave Edmunds
Gallows Pole – Led Zeppelin

October #1 rambling: recovery mode

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival will commission 36 playwrights to translate all of Shakespeare’s plays into modern English.

Still on the mend, wearing this band around my waist, until at least November 9. I will write about this eventually.

I’ve managed to watch more baseball in the past week and a half than I saw the entire regular season. Great to see former Met Rusty Staub after his heart attack. Rooting for the Mets, or if they get eliminated, the Cubs. Just realized that the World Series Game 5 would be November. If it’s the Dodgers in the Series, I’m rooting for the American League team.

ALSO, my office is moving this week. Note to self: do NOT pick up anything over 20 pounds.

Understanding Mass Incarceration and Bringing It Down: An Interview With James Kilgore.

John Oliver: rips GOP candidates for blaming gun violence on mental illness in absence of a plan, and Migrants and Refugees.

Color film was made for white people.

The War on Science, even in Canada.

Seth Meyers explains that ridiculous Congressional hearing over Planned Parenthood and Planned Parenthood’s “Government Funding”: The Same Kind Your Doctor Receives.

What the Speakership Battle is About.

Pope Francis met with an openly gay couple — and unlike Kim Davis, who ambushed him, he did so intentionally, and Was Pope Francis Actually Swindled into Meeting Kim Davis?

If we gotta honor a Christopher…

“Sick of hearing about the damn emails.”

Analysis Ranks Presidential Candidates By Their Supporters’ Grammar.

It costs you $43 every time you wait for the doctor.

What Happens When There’s No Internet. Presented By BuzzFeed & Hyundai – is it real?

Sweden is shifting to a 6-hour work day.

Shakespeare in Modern English? “The Oregon Shakespeare Festival… recently announced that over the next three years, it will commission 36 playwrights to translate all of Shakespeare’s plays into modern English.”

Chaz Ebert reviews the play BlackWhite Love, about Roger and Chaz Ebert.

How to Make a Sandwich. It only took 6 months and cost $1500.

K-Chuck Radio’s Sunshine Pop includes rare music from Mary Hopkin and Victor Garber.

New 2015 remix and video of Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson’s 1983 international smash hit single ‘Say Say Say’.

Van Morrison and the Thirty-One Songs about Nothing But a Bad Contract.

Mark Evanier continues to list the twenty top voice actors in American animated cartoons between 1928 and 1968, including Hans Conried (Snidely Whiplash), Don Messick (Scooby-Doo) Alan Reed (Fred Flintstone), Jack Mercer (Popeye), and Gary Owens (Space Ghost, Roger Ramjet).

GOOGLE ALERT (me)

It’s so very nice that Eddie the Renaissance Geek wished me well after my surgery, given the fact that he’s had much more serious health issues of his own.

Albany High hosts tours in advance of vote on improvements.

What’s the last comic book or graphic novel you picked up at a comic book store? Also, The Big Event effect.

SamuraiFrog: Ant-Man and the Book Light Lady.

Donna’s quote resonated.

GOOGLE ALERT (not me)

New national role for Biscovey head teacher. “Roger Green is one of 70 heads across the country…”

Van Morrison is 70

Irish Heartbeat (1991) is an album of Van Morrison with the Chieftains.

George Ivan ‘Van’ Morrison is one of those artists who’s been around practically as long as I’ve been listening to music.

The Northern Irish singer/songwriter has released over three dozen albums. I have his second solo album, Astral Weeks, and his 2012 album, Born to Sing: No Plan B, but only about a half dozen in between, so there are definite gaps in my Van awareness.

Incidentally, Legacy Recordings has just acquired most of his catalog, and Rhino Remasters, Expands His “Astral Weeks,” “His Band and the Street Choir”.

I dare say if I listened to the entirety of his oeuvre, I’d likely find 25 more songs, but these are the ones that struck a chord with me today. And while the top 7 are probably my favorites, the order is fairly arbitrary.

25. When That Evening Sun Goes Down, from Tupelo Honey (1971) -TH
24. Cleaning Windows, from Beautiful Vision (1982)
23. I’ve Been Working, from His Band and The Street Choir (1970), noted as SC. This was the third solo album he put out, but the first one I owned, so it will be over-represented here.
22. Spanish Rose, from Blowin’ Your Mind! (1967) – BYM
21. Have I Told You Lately, from Avalon Sunset (1989)

20. Close Enough for Jazz, from in Too Long in Exile (1993). There’s also a version, with lyrics, on Born to Sing.
19. Gypsy Queen, from SC
18. Wonderful Remark, from the soundtrack album for The King of Comedy (1983) and The Best of Van Morrison (1990); I have the former, but not the latter
17. Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child, from Poetic Champions Compose (1987)
16. Tupelo Honey, from TH; single went to #47 in 1972

15. Bright Side of the Road, from Into the Music (1979)
14. Call Me Up in Dreamland, from SC; the single went to #95 in 1971
13. Wavelength, from Wavelength (1978); the single went to #42 in 1978
12. Here Comes the Night, from the eponymous first album by the group Them; the single went to #24 in 1965
11. Be Thou My Vision, from Hymns to the Silence (1991). This is actually from a double CD I have never owned, but have played, and there may be songs on here I like even better.

10. Street Choir, from SC
9. Marie’s Wedding, from Irish Heartbeat (1991). This is an album with the Chieftains.
8. Wild Night, from TH; the single went to #28 in 1971
7. Blue Money, from SC; the single went to #23 in 1971
6. Jackie Wilson Said (I’m in Heaven When You Smile), from Saint Dominic’s Preview (1972); the single went to #61 in 1972

5. Brown Eyed Girl, from BYM; the single went to #10 in 1967
4. If I Ever Needed Someone, from SC
3. Moondance, from Moondance (1970); the single went to #92 in 1977, but the song was a staple of FM radio
2. Gloria, from Them; the Them single went to #93 in 1965, and #71 upon reissue in 1966
1. Domino, from SC; the single went to #9 in 1971
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Coverville 1090: That brown-eyed girl is gonna getcha good. Cover stories for Van Morrison and Shania Twain!