Saturday, December 16, 2006

Van was a man in form

OK I take it back. The Van Morrison concert last night was .... well it was really quite good. I'd only seen him once about six years ago and while he played a load of songs then that I recognised I came away thinking he didn't give a shit about the audience or his band.

Well he must have mellowed during the intervening years because last night he was keen to showcase his band and interact with them and the audience throughout the hour and forty minutes he was on stage.

While there was a country lilt to some of his songs, and I suppose somebody has to like country music, thankfully there was a real rythym'n'blues feel to much of the material played.

His final song, Van doesn't really do encores apparently, was Gloria which was a great way to end the night. Not as good as the Eddie and the Hot Rods or Patti Smith versions but hey, give the guy a break, he did a great rendition to send the crowd, probably average age 55 plus, home happy.

One tip if you ever decide to go to see him. When it says 8 o'clock on the tickets it means 8 o'clock be in your seats 'cos I'm going to play my first song. Needless to say we were running up the stairs at five past thinking, like all the other concerts we've been to recently that you can add an hour or so on to the time the 'star' of the show comes on while they try and flog stale beer and merchandise to you.

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