Anyway, this is the last of the stray tracks albums I've made to cover his golden era from the late 1960s through the 1970s. (I should have posted this earlier, but I was trying to find a couple of songs for it, and I finally found them.) The music continues into 1981, but the songs from 1980 and 1981 generally keep to his earlier style.
The first song here, "Real, Real Gone," was one of the highlights of the 1990 album I mentioned above, "Enlightenment." But as can be seen here, it actually dates from much earlier, but he just sat on it for some reason. Perhaps it was due to that shift of styles, especially since he returned to it when his style shifted back.
Three songs - "I'm Ready," "John Brown's Body," and "Sax Instrumental No. 1" - were released as B-sides to various versions of Morrison's "Back on Top." This is odd, because "Back on Top" was released in 1999, and all these songs are from 1978. But it makes more sense if you consider that he had recently released the archival compilation "The Philosopher's Stone," and these songs apparently had just missed making the cut for that.
"Dead Girls of London" is a very strange song for Morrison. He's done soul, jazz, blues, country, folk, and in various combinations, but he's pretty much never done straight rock and roll, at least not since his days with "Them." And yet this song rocks. It was written by Frank Zappa and one of his band members, L. Shankar, but somehow Zappa talked Morrison into singing the lead vocals. (I'm guessing they were recording in the same recording studio at the time.) Zappa wanted to release the Morrison version, but Morrison was on a different record label and that label wouldn't give permission. So a shorter version without Morrison was released instead. The Morrison version didn't come out until a 2011 Zappa archival release.
In my opinion, "Wonderful Remark" is one of the great Morrison songs. It wasn't officially released until 1983, when it showed up on the "King of Comedy" soundtrack. But in fact it was written much earlier. I've included an early version on a 1972 stray tracks album. Even the "King of Comedy" version was actually recorded in 1981, which is why I've included it here.
Also, for sticklers like me, note that Morrison's song "Street Theory," which is from 1980, is almost exactly the same as "Come On Out Child," a song he did in 1975. I didn't realize the similarity until I was listening again to this album before posting it here, and I had a "Hey! That sounds familiar!" moment. "Come On Out Child," is unreleased, but I posted it on my stray tracks album "Not Working for You." "Street Theory" is from the official archival release "The Philosopher's Stone." I've added "Come On Out Child" to the subtitle, since it's the same lyrics and melody.
I've included two songs only as bonus tracks, "Bright Side of the Road" and "Cleaning Windows." That's because both are songs that were officially released on albums in that era, but these are different versions. "Bright Side of the Road" has a very different arrangement, and "Cleaning Windows" has somewhat different lyrics.
01 Real, Real Gone [First Version] (Van Morrison)
02 Stepping Out Queen, Part 2 (Van Morrison)
03 I'm Ready (Van Morrison)
04 John Brown's Body (Van Morrison)
05 Sax Instrumental No. 1 [Affirmation] (Van Morrison)
06 Dead Girls of London (Van Morrison & Frank Zappa)
07 Street Theory [Come On Out Child] (Van Morrison)
08 Down the Road I Go (Van Morrison)
09 Wonderful Remark (Van Morrison)
10 Mona (Van Morrison)
Bright Side of the Road [Alternate Version] (Van Morrison)
Cleaning Windows [Alternate Version] (Van Morrison)
https://www.upload.ee/files/15853456/VanMrsn_1978-1981_RealRelGne_atse.zip.html
The cover art photo is of Morrison waiting around back stage in 1980.
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