OCCUPIED COUNTRY

Bad Vibrations

I was listening to Steve Harley (of Cockney Rebel fame) via the BBC website and heard how the curmudgeonly Van Morrison had taken the hump and stormed off stage after TWO songs !

I went to see him with my dearest about 10 years ago at the Manchester Apollo. Dearest is very much a Folk fan and was impressed with Van’s ‘Irish Heartbeat’ album that was out at the time. Most of his other stuff she’d never heard of apart from ‘Brown-Eyed Girl’ and a few others.

Mr Morrison did two shows at the Apollo – one on Thursday night and one on Friday. We were at the Friday show. I read a review of the Thursday show in the Manchester Evening News who described it as ‘magical’. Apparently Van was all smiles; the vibes must have been truly good and the Feng Shui spot on. Not only did he do a 2 hours plus set, he came back on stage with an acoustic guitar and asked for requests. This went on for nearly another hour before he took his leave of an ecstatic audience.

Understandably – we were looking forward to the gig after that review ! (You can see where this is going can’t you ?)

He did slightly more than two songs – about an hour actually. God knows what we in the audience had done, but it was evident we weren’t in his good books; so he sods off ! After a lot of clapping and cheering the miserable bugger finally appeared back on stage and did anther 3 or 4 songs. An Irish guy next to me was trying to explain how everything had to be just right before Van could give of his all. I explained how everything had to be just right for me to be able to enjoy and be impressed. £30+ wasted on a bloke who obviously couldn’t be arsed was neither enjoyable nor impressive.

Astral Weeks is NOT one of the best albums of all time either ! Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

On the same show Steve Harley was discussing Cat Steven’s music from the early 70s. He ended his little vignette with the comment “Islam has taken him”. A bit rich that I thought coming, as it did, from the mouth of a born again Christian.

Staying on a musical theme......White Stripes ? What am I missing ?