April 28, 2004

You've Got Ringworm: Van Morrison's Contract-Breaking Session
(Originally aired 29th Sept 2003)

Revelation of the week: Van Morrison is a great comic songwriter! As evidence of this, I submit the legendary Final Bang Sessions...
In 1967, shortly after recording "Brown-Eyed Girl", Van had a serious falling-out with his label, Bang Records, but found that he was contracted to record one more album before he could leave. With bile coursing through his veins, the pissed-off young "musical visionary" went into the studio and churned out 30 stream-of-consciousness songs that took about as long to write as they did to record.

The results were a mixture of petulant denunciation, banal doggerel paraphrased in as many ways as possible, and the occasional masterpiece of inspired surrealism. The highlight being his heartfelt ode to intestinal parasites, "Ringworm"... Even if you hate the rest of Van's serious output, I promise that you will love this... Download and enjoy. (The rest of this magnum opus can be downloaded from EMusic. The mp3 I've posted was originally part of the now-defunct 365 Days Project.)

Posted by Warren at April 28, 2004 12:15 AM | Petulant Rockers