Van Morrison - It's Too Late to Stop Now Vol. I, II, III & IV Caledonia Soul Reverie & Worship Thread

Van fan's holy grail is here, the expanded 4 disc set...Brad wrote a great review on Pitchfork

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/22004-its-too-late-to-stop-now-volumes-ii-iii-iv-dvd/

this is gonna be a Matrix Tapes type thing for me where I'm like fuck all other music....His command at this point and the insane mix of widescreen dramatic big band jazzbo arrangements with a super tough almost James Brown level of start/stop precision, this is such an amazing addition to the work of Van Morrison and I think now taken as a whole may be is best work overall....

anyway Van the Man.

yeah, i've listened to all of it and it is amazing. incredible band, incredible performances from Van. the pure swagger of the Rainbow Theatre show is something else. need to buy the set to see the DVD for sure.

Saw the NY Times praise from Pareles too, but I haven't heard this yet myself--

in part

By 1973, Mr. Morrison had consummated his fusion of rock, R&B, gospel, jazz, country, blues, folk, Celtic and classical music, and he had built an eager audience with hits like “Moondance” and “Domino.” He had also, crucially, found flexible and attentive musicians, notably John Platania on guitar and Jef Labes on keyboards.

“Volume I” was precisely culled, but the additional volumes are well justified. The newly released tracks barely overlap from disc to disc, harking back to an era when each concert was an experiment. When titles do recur, they have different tempos (“I Just Want to Make Love to You”) and very different vocal performances (“Caravan”). The Caledonia Soul Orchestra included a string section and horns, playing fixed arrangements and rehearsed passages, but every song made room for improvisation. The DVD, from London concerts, shows a young Mr. Morrison smoking cigarettes onstage and doing a few soul-man kicks and jumps. It also shows how grumpy he has generally looked as he performs. But there’s no hiding the passion and joy in this music.

JON PARELES

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/12/arts/music/van-morrison-ossie-egyptian-lover-vaughan-reissues.html

i was trying to figure out why van morrison is so great but the vocalists he's inspired over the years are usually terrible -- and i think it might be the grumpiness! or just a lack of pandering to the audience. he's not all 'let's have a fun time, everybody' he's SERIOUS, even when the songs get light and bubbly.

Our own Brad: http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/22004-its-too-late-to-stop-now-volumes-ii-iii-iv-dvd/

Alfred, that link was posted up top...But why not again, its a good one

woops!

if you want even more, there's this bootleg of a troubadour '73 show. it rules too!
https://youtu.be/TX7tEw0GlJY

he's not all 'let's have a fun time, everybody' he's SERIOUS, even when the songs get light and bubbly.

witness the grand existential sorrow he wrings out of kermit the frog's "it's not easy bein' green", unreal

louis prima is green!

iiiii am green!

the "Brown Eyed Girl" at the Troubadour is such a clever arrangement, like they kinda turn the riff and the accents all around but it still grooves

there are literally a million amazing things where Van will SING. SOME. THING. STA! CCA! TO! and the drummer will perfectly do a combo bass drunk/hi-hat kit in time with Van's vocals, it's like they are sharing the same brain

Releasing right before Father's Day is bit on the nose.

I say I as place my order for my father

andwesailedandwesailed....andwesailedandwesailed-uh...andweailedandwesailed away from Denmark...all the way to Caledonia....AWAY FROM DENMARK...all the way to Caledonia....lookinforabrandnewstart....lookinforabrandnewstart...

"pure swagger" otm

This looks fantastic obviously. But would it have killed him to play Astral Weeks or And It Stoned Me or Saint Dominic's Preview fer cryin out loud?

a performance of "saint dominic's preview" is on the original lp

i was watching this recently. i dig the stripped-down set.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHBnAtGjBG8

honestly i feel like he had the whole live band thing down by 1970. if you listen to stuff that far back its still so impressive. and he was what like 25 years old? that boggles my mind. 25 is like 10 now. which means he was around 28 in 1973. i don't know how you look and sound like that and be that young. and uh write songs like that...

His maturity is kinda staggering - if maturity is the right word. Without it you end up with words like sagacity and wisdom which sound kinda hokey but they feel closer somehow. Dunno.

Just having first listen to the new editions and they're glorious. There's a version of Into the Mystic that just damn near made me levitate.

i'm about 4 listens into vol I, and will soon proceed into II-IV. previous to this, i did multiple multiples of Pacific High/Inner Mystic sets. though the Caledonia Soul Orch is fucking wonderful and amazing in itltsn vol I, and also though his vol I performance is energetic and fully engaged and great in it, i don't love the show nearly in the way that i love inner mystic. at first i hoped that the problem was that my headphones were inadequately producing the depth of the pieces. so after switching to ok speakers, and then back to better phones, i just don't like the arrangements all that much. they're wonderfully done, but they're too much for me. and the string section, i just don't want that in this r&b. and i really want to, i'm listening to caravan now, but i don't need or want that. (i really love his respectful ID of his band, which is awesome and deserved).

THere are some early and mid 70s live sets turning up on Tradersden recently, also several from much later.
I was listening to him from '71 yesterday which was really great It had Platanaia onboard but I'm not sure how much of the rest of the Caledonia Soul orchestra.
Also had some '75 sets turned up which sounded great.

BUt I weish the cds of the mid 70s stuff would appear.

I picked up band and Street choir recently too cos it was down to €4.99 in a local shop. Nice stuff.