astral_weeks

Astral Weeks by Van Morrison is exactly 40 years old this month, being first released in November 1968. The basic theme of the album is the gap between earthly love and heavenly love, "the light at the end of the tunnel" as Morrison once put it. This was one of the first CDs I bought back in about 1985, and I played it over and over again.

Morrison, apparently, doesn't like many of his live performances appearing on youtube. Perhaps he makes a lot of money from concert dvds, I don't know. I wanted a recent clip of him performing Astral Weeks, and the one below is the best I could do. It's partially obscured, but the sound isn't too bad (one of the guitars is a little too loud). It gets the feel of the song across nicely, and that's the main thing.

If I ventured in the slipstream
Between the viaducts of your dream
Where immobile steel rims crack
And the ditch in the back roads stop
Could you find me?
Would you kiss-a my eyes?
To lay me down
In silence easy
To be born again

From the far side of the ocean
If I put the wheels in motion
And I stand with my arms behind me
And I'm pushing on the door
Could you find me?
Would you kiss-a my eyes?
To lay me down
In silence easy
To be born again

There you go
Standing with the look of avarice
Talking to Huddie Ledbetter
Showing pictures on the wall
Whispering in the hall
And pointing a finger at me
There you go, there you go
Standing in the sun darling
With your arms behind you
And your eyes before
There you go
Taking good care of your boy

Seeing that he's got clean clothes
Putting on his little red shoes
I see you know he's got clean clothes
A-putting on his little red shoes
A-pointing a finger at me
And here I am
Standing in your sad arrest
Trying to do my very best
Looking straight at you
Coming through, darling

To be born again
In another world
In another time
Got a home on high
Ain't nothing but a stranger in this world
I'm nothing but a stranger in this world
I got a home on high
In another land
So far away
So far away
Way up in the heaven
We are going up to home
In another time
In another place
In another face

Cheers, Tom.