Customer Reviews

Keep It Simple

5 star:		(35)
4 star:		(25)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The ever-enduring crooner returns with a collection of stripped-back, simple songs diverging how it feels to be reaching the twilight of life. Yet Van Morrison keeps all the controlled energy of someone who still has something to pass on to the world.
"Keep It Simple" is a mainly bluesy affair. He's returned to the usual mixture of autobiographical fare and the kind of mix of jazz, folk, blues, country and soul that may be chock-full of lyrical cliche but is always lifted by a voice that really hasn't deteriorated much in the last twenty years. Let's face it: the blues wouldn't be the blues without it's lyrical template. It's the way it's sung that matters, and Van is still peerless in this respect.
Husky, slurred, simple yet honest, the album is one enduring constant is in its title: the acceptance that less is more and that with restraint true quality always prevails.
After five decades of prolific and heart-felt melodies this is amazingly Van Morrison's 33rd studio album but is shows as much dedication as many new artist's debut.
His first recording of original material since 2005 it's also the first album penned solely by Van Morrison's own hand since "Back On Top" in 1999.
You have to try very to hard to find Van Morrison doing much wrong and even when he's not breaking new ground there's still generally enough going on to keep his music worth a listen.
On this one, he does more than just tow the line and even offers up one or two gems in the making - "Lover Come Back" and "End Of The Land" prove in particular why he's not yet disappeared into retirement.
There's a certain grace to Van's stripped-back band and as always he evokes images of sorrow and anguish but with such beauty and warmth that you can't help but smile when you hear him.
It maybe that he has already reached his peak, but what "Keep It Simple" proves is that with the right combination of sensitivity and commitment to his art Van Morrison can still stay ahead the rest of the field and, what's more important, can do it with dignity.
The CD is a better Van Morrison album than anyone had a right to expect - not least on its closing song. Fanning out from a rimshot-riding mandolin phrase, the killer track "Behind the Ritual" returns to a theme that has informed his best songs from "Into the Mystic" and on.
Drinking wine and dancing like a dervish, Van finds "the spiritual behind the ritual".
The supporting cast acquit themselves admirably as well. Of special note is the steel guitar of Cindy Cashdollar (of Asleep At The Wheel). The only downside is that the backing vocals are a trifle over-egged at times.
But on the whole this is a lovely welcome back to a man who's been increasingly offhand in his output of late.
It may look simple, but only a master like Van could pull this off.
Another career high from a great original in the 40th anniversary year of his classic "Astral Weeks".
Simple, but totally brilliant.

Keep It Simple - like most latter day Van Morrison - is neither as brilliant as you might hope, nor as disappointing as you might fear.

The problem, for me, is the decline of Morrison's songwriting. While he was never a lyricist in the class of Dylan or Joni Mitchell, he could once conjure marvelous images and had a poet's ear. He also had the vocal chops - blending jazz, blues and soul - to create a unique style of music. 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 (Astral Weeks) Those words read well off the page, but as performed by Van Morrison, they were magic. As a singer, he had no peer, and the combination of his words and music lifted Morrison into the highest echelon - alongside Dylan and Mitchell. His best songs were autobiographical but universal, beautifully crafted, tinged with mystery and ambiguity.

While he has had many ups and downs along the way, the deterioration of Morrison's lyrics might be traced to the otherwise triumphant Hymns to the Silence (1991). Since then, there have been a raft of songs about the woes of being Van Morrison in the music business - Professional Jealousy, Why Must I Always Explain?, Big Time Operators, Songwriter, They Sold Me Out, and now, School of Hard Knocks. Then there are the songs about the woes of simply being Van Morrison - Some Peace of Mind, Too Long In Exile, Melancholia, Underlying Depression. Now there's Don't Go the Nightclubs Anymore.

Morrison's response to criticism of his self-absorption is the title song of Keep It Simple: They mocked me 'cos I told it like it was/Wrote about disappointment and greed/Wrote about what we really didn't need in our lives/Make us feel alive and whole.

That brings us to the real problem, which is not so much Morrison's subject matter as his execution. Lyrically, Don't Go To Nightclubs Anymore and Keep It Simple (to give but two examples) are simply uninspired. They are too literal, like unedited diary entries. It's one thing to keep it simple, another to make it banal.

Too many recent Van Morrison songs lack any real insight or imagination, let alone the sparkling imagery and wordplay of which he is (or was) capable. At worst, they are little more than a pastiche of hackneyed phrases.

The biggest disappointment on Keep It Simple is Behind the Ritual, in which he literally sings blah blah blah blah. The effect, from the man who sang Madame George and made an art form of repetition (the loves to love/ the loves to love) is self-parody.

So why three stars? Because, lyrics aside, Keep It Simple is a fair collection of songs. They don't score highly for originality, but at this stage of Morrison's career, you wouldn't expect that. The arrangements hardly have a hair out of place. Sans horn section, the album has a consistent, intimate groove. Although there are a variety of song forms (blues, folk, pop) the album feels all of a piece. The band is excellent, especially long-time sideman John Allair on the B3, and the singer, he's Van Morrison for Christ's sake.

The radio-friendly That's Entrainment is the brightest moment - a simple three chords, an infectious underlying rhythm, and a clever play on words (entertainment/entrainment) make this a contender for future 'best of' compilations. Lover Come Back is a simple but effective song of yearning. Song of Home is a nostalgic, folky piece with a lovely sense of place, providing the welcome Celtic quota.

It's worth pondering what you'd make of Keep It Simple if you'd never heard of Van Morrison. My best guess is that I would regard the album as quite a find. (There aren't many unknowns, after all, who can sing like Van Morrison.) The point is that any new work by an artist of Morrison's stature will inevitably be assessed against the standards of the artist's best work.

A lot of new music is lightweight, blatantly derivative, gimmicky, or ephemeral in its appeal. Keep It Simple is none of those. It's better than most stuff that makes it onto, ummm, polycarbonate.

This CD is certainly worth a listen, and there's much to recommend it. Just don't pay too much attention to the words.

With his latest work, "Keep it Simple", Van is once again the man! I purchased his "Down the Road" CD several years ago and found it to be good, but somewhat uninspired, and all the songs start to sound the same. After resigning myself to the fact that his music would probably only be mediocre at this stage of his life I was VERY pleasantly surprised to find Van going back to his soulful roots with this new album. It has a retro yet fresh feeling to it with the incorporation of the female backing vocals and the organ. The songs are really moving like his early works were in the 70's. I also enjoy the lyrics in these songs as he sees life from the perspective of a man his age. I give him a lot of credit to put out a piece of work like this at this point in his career.... when the creative juices are usually dried up! "Keep It Simple" is a work of art kept simple. I would totally recommend buying this if you're a Van fan!

If anyone has any doubts as to whether Van Morrison retains a substantial fan base, just a glance at the large number of reviews written for Keep It Simple in the two weeks since its release should dispel them. Read the reviews and you will see that the fan base is passionate as well. Now some folks like to live in the musical past and have a particular album in mind by which they gauge all others. That's kind of unfair to the artist. You don't want all Van Morrison albums to sound like the one that is your favorite, do you? I don't. While I have my favorite Van Morrison albums, I want to hear him play something new and possibly great everytime he makes a record.
It's natural of course to make comparisons, but I try to hear an album rise or fall on its own merits. And though Keep It Simple will probably not be seen as one of Morrison's best, it has quite a lot going for it. For one, it is mellow and is one of the most soulful records he's made in a long time. My favorites are How Can A Poor Boy?, Don't Go To Nightclubs Anymore, and Song of Home. There is nothing unlistenable except the blah, blah, blah passage in the final cut that almost ruins it. Some say that Van is having a little fun there, but its at our expense. Given the subject of the song, maybe the most charitable interpretation would be that he is expressing what he thinks about the chatter of the jabbering drunks he's leaving in his past.
Those who buy Keep It Simple will get nearly fifty minutes of music and a small booklet containing lyrics and all the info about who plays what on which song. Most people who have followed Van Morrison's career for years will like this album just fine. I like it as least as well as his last album and will certainly listen again from time to time.

On first listen I was disappointed at the opening numbers--seemingly throw-away songs that reminded me of Van as his most uninspiring moments. Some of your are already getting ready to click and comment on this reviewer's cluelessness, but let me finish. Van's best work is among the most soul-felt work an artist has ever produced, and he's left a very high bar for what the lover of his work wishes for. Somewhere into the cd, Van delivers: "Keep it Simple" is a fine cut, but "End of the Land" is just about as fine and blue-eyed-Belfast soul as anything else VM has ever offered to his listeners. "Behind the Ritual" is another gem that gives us Van in the zone that makes us forgive some of his less successful efforts. I started listening to the c.d. with those three cuts programmed first, and all of a sudden the lesser tracks started opening up. I'm not too picky--all I want is brilliance before I accept the more humble songs. If you're willing to make up your own track list, I think you'll start to see that this is one of the cd's worthy of the artist who gave the world some of the best music in the last 45 years. Thank you Van. Thank you.

I had high hopes when Van signed with roots rock label Lost Highway. But after several lackluster records - including the dreadful "What's wrong with this picture" and the dull country record "Pay the devil" - Van has delivered the record I've been imagining. The material and his singing are strong, as are the arrangements and production, and the whole cd has a wonderful organic feel to it. There are a few vague references to "the myth" and "propaganda" (on "What's Wrong...", his paranoid musings made him sound mentally ill), but overall, these are Van's strongest batch of songs in a long while, maybe since "Into the Music." Makes a great companion piece with Dylan's "Modern Times."

Thank you, thank you, thank you for a record that cuts through BS. If you've been moved to tears by Springsteen's wish to "hear some rhythm" that could obliterate Radio Nowhere, this is the record for you. The moment I heard Van's voice I realized how starving I was for real music, a real man's voice, and a singer whose technique was technique-less. This is RADIO SOMEWHERE.

Other than "Moondance" which came out when I was in high school and includes the song "Moondance" as well as a copy of Van Morrison's greatest hits, that was all I owned by him. Thanks to Amazon.com's feature of being able to listen to "snippets" of songs from each CD, I liked what I heard and ordered this CD. Van Morrison still has a good voice and each cut is good and it's not like you want to skip a couple. It's a little more bluesy that I remember his older music to be. I recommended this CD to several of my friends and relatives.

Van Morrison's What's Wrong With This Picture? put three songs in my personal top ten including my #1 "Evening In June" plus "Once in a Blue Moon" & "Whinin' Boy Moan." When Van is hot, the singer reaches blast furnace temperatures and is emotionally incendiary. He enjoys the unique position of being able to follow his muse and allow his audience to follow. In so doing, his artistry remains high in his best moments.

"Keep It Simple" has some excellent moments. "That's Entrainment" is a delightful track with the classic Morrison sway, part soul, part jazz, "You with your ballerina dance, well you put me back in a trance." I had to look up "entrain" which means "enter or put into railway train." I'm not sure I totally get the connection, but I love the sound. "Lover Come Back" is such a classically good song that I had to check to see that Van wasn't covering some standard that had escaped my attention. His voice bubbles over with emotion, "Since you went away, I'm a lonely, lonely one; Come on back to stay; you are the only one." "End of the Land" is exquisite with its sense of rejuvenation that comes from the oceanside. "Keep It Simple" has some classic Morrison tracks and is a delightful disc by which to unwind. Enjoy!

On Saturday, April 26, 2008, I attended Van Morrison's concert tour for the KEEP IT SIMPLE album in Goteborg, Sweden. Prompt, as always, the show began at 7:30pm with a cast of 11 musicians + a couple of female backing vocals. His performance was all business and was being recorded "Live", as evidenced by three separate stations manned by sound engineers. His mastery of the instruments chosen for the show, being his Tenor Sax and Pocket Harp, Guitar and Ukelele was performed with jazzman's precision, but more evident was his voice that has never abandoned him and has only improved with age.

The show was a bit slow at the start and he played a little more country than I would have preferred, but eventually he got things rollin' and got the Swedish crowd a-clappin' and their feet a-tappin'. He had brought together some great musicians for the album and tour band. Especially, a young woman who I believe her name was Sarah Jory? Am not certain of her name, as Van never noted anyone's name (not like him - unusual) and there was no program available. Anyway, she played Steel Guitar and Slide, on what appeared to be a "Resonator 0 Style" Guitar (you may remember the guitar featured on the cover of Dire Straits - Brothers in Arms album?). This young lady musician was everywhere, playing leads, singing vocals, and proved her varied talents by giving one heck-of-a demonstration of her rhythmic musical ability by performing "hand-clapping" on "That's Entrainment", which is barely heard on the album, but greatly enjoyed by myself and everyone in the live performance. [According to Webster, the word "ENTRAINMENT" (not, Entertainment) a verb, meaning: "To go, or put aboard a train." Beats me, what he's relating to here, but maybe somebody will post on [...] in the future].

A highlight of the show and the turning point in mood (at least for me) was when Van reintroduced an old favorite "Saint James Infirmary", which I haven't heard him play for years. It was an excellent arrangement and the band excelled in this old New Orelans standard. It got the blues a-flowin' from him and for the next 45-minutes it was all uphill.

Also, enjoyable was the inclusion into the band of an electric violin played by fiddler Tony Fitzgibbon; and, the Hammond B3 Organ of John Allair. That reminds me every time I hear a musician playing the B3; it brings back memories of the musician, known as "The B3 Beast" - Lee Michaels, who Van certainly remembers from his early San Francisco days. Nobody has yet to match, or even duplicate Lee on the B3, but I keep hoping somebody will appear, whereas, after 6-albums in 4-years, Lee disappeared in 1971, never to be heard from again.

Van the Man, took one bow returning to the stage to perform "Brown-Eyed Girl' and finished with "G-L-O-R-I-A", to an aroused standing hand-clapping and foot-stomping full house. Business like, the show ended at 9:00pm, and everything he had to say was said in that eventful and enjoyable performance.

All-in-all, this album is certainly worth the price. Regardless, of what the critics say, as they only sharpen their pencils to deliver venom at their favorite target, whereas, Van (at least these days) has chosen the high road and applies his five decades of proven talent, as songsmith the creation of lyrics and tune that will far outlast whatever his critics may write. Rave on John Donne! RAVE ON!

If you get the opportunity, be sure YOU don't miss Van's "Live Performance" of the KEEP IT SIMPLE tour.

MAY 15, 2008 - ADDED TO MY ORIGINAL REVIEW (ABOVE) OF APRIL 28, 2008

Earlier last month I wrote a review after attending Van's LIVE concert in Goteborg, Sweden for his "Keep It Simple" album. At that time I rated his new album with 4-Stars, but have up'd my rating after listening numerous times to a more deserved 5-Stars album! In fact, this is the best writing the 'master songsmith' has done since "Astral Weeks," and he may well be on the verge of delivering his best works ever!

Now for those that have complained about his "Blah, Blah, Blah" on the last track - "Behind The Ritual" - get a grip, as he's making jest of himself, as well as anyone who gets loose behind drinking from the "Nectar of the Gods", and enjoying conversation with good friends. If, you've been there then you'll understand the "Blah, Blah, Blah"? To prove my point, next time you're enjoying the company of good friends, pour yourself a glass of wine put "Behind the Ritual" on REPEAT. Believe me, when the evening is over and your friends have departed the song will be playing over n' over in your head for days to come. Maybe then you'll get it! Enjoy!

And as for those who hear Van the Man complaining in his songs about show biz record promoters and syndicators, then you probably not a real fan of the blues, or you'd be aware that John Lee Hooker often sang about these same "Predators and Leeches" of the recording industry, as does Morrison.

Rave on John Donne... RAVE ON!