Van Morrison – Astral Weeks (CD)
Product Details
Recorded over just two days in September 1968 with a group of jazz session players who had never met Morrison before entering the studio, the results captured something genuinely unrepeatable. Morrison was 22 years old, freshly out of a record deal with Bang Records, and working largely outside the rock idiom entirely, closer in spirit to Van Dyke Parks or Tim Buckley than anything on AM radio that autumn.
Remastered audio, each album also features previously unreleased versions of several album tracks.
Astral Weeks failed to make the charts when it was released in the fall of 1968. But 47 years later, the album has achieved a near-mythic status across generations of listeners who have "ventured in the slipstream" and fallen under the music's spell. "Any best-of list is unthinkable - and worthless - without it," writes Cory Frye in the album's liner notes.
The four unreleased recordings that debut on this deluxe edition highlight the interplay between Morrison and the quartet that joined him in the studio - bassist Richard Davis, guitarist Jay Berliner, percussionist Warren Smith, Jr., and Modern Jazz Quartet drummer Connie Kay. These bonus tracks include the first take of "Beside You," the full version of "Slim Slow Slider," and a stripped back version of "Madame George" that emphasizes the vibraphone.
Tracklist
Part One: In The Beginning
Part Two: Afterwards
Bonus Tracks - Previously Unissued
UPC: 081227952310
Label: Rhino
Release Date: 10.30.15
Format: CD