Van Morrison Astral Weeks (1968){2015

Astral Weeks is generally considered one of the best albums in pop music history, but for all that renown, it is anything but an archetypal rock & roll album. It isn’t a rock & roll album at all. Van Morrison plays acoustic guitar and sings in his elastic, bluesy, soulful voice, accompanied by crack group of jazz studio players: guitarist Jay Berliner, upright bassist Richard Davis, Modern Jazz Quartet drummer Connie Kay, vibraphonist Warren Smith and soprano saxophonist John Payne (also credited on flute, though that’s debatable—some claim an anonymous flutist provided those parts).

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.

Van Morrison - Astral Weeks (1968). Astral Weeks is generally considered one of the best albums in pop music history, but for all that renown, it is anything but an archetypal rock & roll album. It it isn't a rock & roll album at all. Van Morrison plays acoustic guitar and sings in his elastic, bluesy, soulful voice, accompanied by crack group of jazz studio players: guitarist Jay Berliner, upright bassist Richard Davis, Modern Jazz Quartet drummer Connie Kay, vibraphonist Warren Smith and soprano saxophonist John Payne (also credited on flute, though that's debatable - some claim an anonymous flutist provided those parts). Producer Lewis Merenstein added chamber orchestrations later and divided the album into halves: "In The Beginning" and "Afterwards" with four tunes under each heading. Morrison's songs are an instinctive, organic mixture of Celtic folk, blues, and jazz…

Van Morrison - Moondance (1970) {2013 Warner Deluxe Edition 4CD + Blu-ray}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.51 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 601 Mb
Blu-ray -> 4.26 Gb | Dolby TrueHD 5.1 / Dolby TrueHD 2.0 | no video | ISO Image
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (png) -> 144 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1970, 2013 Warner Bros. Records | 8122796385
Rock / Pop / Soft Rock / Soul / Irish Folk

In the fall of 1969, Van Morrison entered the studio to record Moondance, the album that would soon become his commercial breakthrough and one of the most beloved recordings of all time. Fans will soon have the rare opportunity to experience this classic album like never before with the newly remastered and expanded version featuring 50 unreleased tracks including studio outtakes of favorites, plus multiple takes and a final mix of the unheard track "I Shall Sing." The Deluxe Edition includes 4 CDs/1 Blu-Ray Audio with newly remastered version of the original album, three discs of previously unreleased music from the sessions, a Blu-Ray Audio disc with high-resolution 48K 24 bit PCM stereo and DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround sound audio of original album (no video). The package is presented in a linen-wrapped folio Includes a booklet with liner notes from Alan Light and original engineer Elliot Scheiner.

This very well-assembled, handsomely packaged bootleg gathers interesting odds and ends, mostly unreleased, from Morrison's early career. His very early career, actually; ten of the 18 songs were done by his pre-solo career group Them in 1964-1966, while the remaining eight are publishing demos from the summer of 1968. Leading off the set are two unreleased June 1964 versions of songs Them later released, "Stormy Monday" and "Don't Start Crying Now." The "Stormy Monday" take is definitely rawer than the released one, with the kind of eerie knife-scraped descending guitar swoops that prove that Jimmy Page probably didn't play all of the guitar parts on Them's early records. "Don't Start Crying Now" isn't as good as the official version (put out as Them's first single), particularly since one verse or so seems to have been hacked out of the early part of the tape. Then there are four good 1965 BBC live-in-the-studio performances, including…

Purple Pyramid's Essential Van Morrison is comprised of the (much compiled) recordings Morrison made for Bang! after his split from Them. Teaming with Brill Building vet producer Bert Berns, Morrison's wild-eyed lyricism is often a tight fit with Berns' straight-ahead commercial sound (see the silly but fun "Chick-a-Boom" for an example)….