Tuesday, February 4, 2025

Van Morrison - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: 1984-1995

When I posted Van Morrison's "BBC Sessions, Volume 1," I commented that it was a shame Morrison hardly ever performed for the BBC in 1980s. Musical associate MZ saw that comment, and sent me some stuff. Based mostly on that, I was able to put together this album of BBC sessions.

"Sense of Wonder" is from an appearance on the BBC TV show "The Old Grey Whistle Test" in 1984. "In the Garden" is from another BBC TV show in 1986. 

The next four songs come from a BBC TV special about Morrison called "One Irish Rover." It collected a bunch of different performances. One of them featured Van Morrison and Bob Dylan in 1989 singing just as a duo in Athens, Greece, on a hill overlooking the Acropolis. It's great to have these two musical giants collaborate, but to be honest it generally seemed like Dylan was winging it and didn't know Morrison's songs that well. But he did play some nice harmonica, and he sang more assertively on "One Irish Rover." The last of those four songs, "And It Stoned Me," was from the same session, but wasn't actually included in the "One Irish Rover" show. (You can find YouTube videos of all four songs, if you're interested in seeing and not just hearing them.)

"Whenever God Shines His Light" is from the BBC TV show "Top of the Pops," in 1989. Most appearances on that show are lipsynced, but not this one. It's a duet of Morrison and Cliff Richard, the same as on Morrison's 1989 studio album "Avalon Sunset." The next two songs, "Avalon of the Heart" and "So Quiet in Here" are from an appearance on the "Late Show," another BBC TV show, in 1990. Finally, the last two songs are from the show "Later... with Jools Holland" in 1995.

Everything here is unreleased on audio format, though the "One Irish Rover" show has been released on video. For the songs with cheering studio audiences, I used the MVSEP program to get rid of the cheering. "Whenever God Shines His Light" has "[Edit]" in the title because the first few seconds were missing. I fixed that by patching in some music from later in the song.

This album is 43 minutes long.

01 Sense of Wonder (Van Morrison)
02 In the Garden (Van Morrison)
03 Crazy Love (Van Morrison with Bob Dylan)
04 Foreign Window (Van Morrison with Bob Dylan)
05 One Irish Rover (Van Morrison with Bob Dylan)
06 And It Stoned Me (Van Morrison with Bob Dylan)
07 Whenever God Shines His Light [Edit] (Van Morrison & Cliff Richard)
08 Avalon of the Heart (Van Morrison)
09 So Quiet in Here (Van Morrison)
10 Don't Worry about a Thing (Van Morrison)
11 That's Life (Van Morrison)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/gfJA3oVS

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/NQkCrr4NOO0M1l5/file

The cover photo is from a photo shoot in Bath, Britain, in May, 1989.

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