MUSIC REVIEWS

By R. A. Pearson

Van Morrison recently released a live CD Astral Weeks, Live At The Hollywood Bowl, an entire redocumentation of his cult classic album from his early years. The early release followed the hit “Brown Eyed Girl,” and Morrison was searching for a sound. Astral Weeks was a rock, fusion jazz, album which never caught on in the mainstream 60s music scene; however, it did become a major influential album which has resonated in the minds of many musicians and shaped the direction of rock music for 40 years since its appearance. Astral Weeks, Live At The Hollywood Bowl, is Morrison’s attempt to recreate the sound live and the CD does a fair job of doing that.

When the live and studio versions are played back to back, the live version has more musicians and of course the lyrics sometimes are not as clear as on the studio version. The lyrics can sometimes be a problem with any Van Morrison live CD (check out A Night In San Francisco). However, the live version is an adventure in itself. In several cuts Morrison ventures places where he did not go in 1968 in the studio, making the CD a real treasure for the true Van Morrison fan. The CD also contains two additional cuts, “Listen to the Lion” and “Common One.” Van Morrison fans should pick up a copy, and for the uninitiated Van Morrison listeners who need to hear the CD that altered the course of music a little in 1968, they need to pick up the original Astral Weeks.

Another new CD Blue Lights On The Runway by the Irish band Bell X 1 has hit the music stores and contains several great tunes on the CD. The opening cuts, “The Ribs of a Broken Umbrella,” and “How Your Heart is Wired” are wonderful songs and set the stage for great ballads to staggering rock’n roll knock downs. From the emotional “The Light Catches Your Face,” to “The Great Defector” and “A Better Band” this group is being compared to everything from the Talking Heads to Okkervil River. The major players in the band are Paul Noonan, Dave Geraghty and Dominic Phillips. The band has been popular in Ireland for a while, and Blue Lights On The Runway is expected to put them on the worldwide grid.

Steve Winwood released a CD last year entitled Nine Lives. The CD contains nine new cuts including “Dirty City” and “Other Shore” which received airplay on some independent radio stations. (Winwood’s old Blind Faith bandmate Eric Clapton joins him as a guest guitarist on “Dirty City.”) Other interesting songs include “I’m Not Drowning,” “Fly,” “Raging Sea,” and “Secrets.” The album is very typical of Winwood’s style as the songs move from rock, to blues, to jazz with his unmistakable voice, haunting lyrics, and musical arrangements ever present on each composition. Of course the listener will hear the artists ever-present Hammond B3 organ all over the arrangements on this CD.

Local artist Karl Davis has made several national and world tours since fronting his first professional band in 1989. In 2000 Karl and his blues band were asked to audition for and awarded a spot in the French festival Rendez-vous de l’Erdre, Nantes. At this concert, held on a small island in the center of Nantes, Karl sang with and formed powerful friendships with many fine blues and soul musicians. As a direct result, the CD entitled Karl W. Davis and the Milkmen Tear It Up was recorded in 2005. In addition, Karl wrote and sang tracks on The Bad Mules (Nantes, FR) CD “Who Drank My Beer” in 2007. This international collaboration continues.

Karl is now an independent artist, which gives him the freedom to perform, tour, write and record with many musicians around the world. His web site is www.karlwdavisandfriends.com and he can also be found on Myspace. Several free downloads are offered on these sites.

Editor’s Note: Here is something you will never see in a Clarion Issue Music Review: This is strictly a pantagraphic hauntography of proto-mantic motherworlds. Mysteriograms of toposonic radiances are deconstructed and raptoluminal resonances at residual numinophillic nemeta sites are reiterated in the mycoboreal precints. (From a press release publicizing the music of the band Infernal Method.)