Customer Reviews

Magic Time

5 star:		(49)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Finally, Van is back to doing what he does best. Easily his best CD in a decade, from the opening melody of "Stranded" through to "Carry On Regardless," Morrison is more in his own skin than he has been for years. On yet another record label, he has jettisoned most of his homages to old R&B singers, walked away from silly partnerships, and found his way back to that Irish world of melody. Perhaps not entirely enveloped by the mystic, these songs nonetheless ring with an authenticity that has been largely absent in all of his 21st century work. There is still his nagging whining about how hard he has it in the record business. Someone needs to write to him and tell him no one really cares. It certainly hasn't impacted his property value in the south of Dublin, whose wonderful coastline is beautifully photographed in the wee booklet. Maybe it's just a function of being from Belfast. Anyway...
Speaking of Ireland, "Celtic New Year" is the kind of tune you've been waiting for him to write for years. It would be equally at home on any of his late 80's- early 90's CDs. You can easily imagine this fine song following "Orangefield". "Keep Mediocrity at Bay" is a blues romp that falls squarely in with his avocation for all things Hooker, and his harp solo is reminiscent of the work he did on John Lee's recent DVD. So too with "Evening Train." It's the kind of song that rocks with a bluesy funk that's just about perfect. The musicianship on this CD is spot on throughout. Like some of the best CDs of the seventies and his work with Georgie Fame as bandleader, Morrison has assembled a band that knows just what a song needs and nothing more. Because of the quality of the songs, Morrison's romp through these numbers is far less contrived than it has been on the past 5 or 6 discs. Even his takes on Sinatra's "This Love of Mine" and Perry Como's (imagine...) "I'm Confessin'" are the real deal. Recalling his quip about Rod Stewart's take on "Have I Told You," "Thanks for makin' a lucky man feel very old," Van instead does the tunes rightly.
So when he gets to "Just Like Greta," there is such aheartfelt sincerity to his dismay that this becomes one of the lyrical standouts that will replay for you many times. While garbo just disappeared, Morrison growls in exitential despair. "Gypsy in My Soul," also rings with an authority that reminds you how strongly he can capture a certain human restlessness, much as Lightfoot, Eric Andersen or Robbie Robertson.
"Lonely and Blue" is a melancholic ballad well suited for late night. Although it comes perilously close to lounge music, the restraint of the musicians rescue the song from, well, mediocrity. "The Lion This Time" is an abstract tale that would have fit in perfectly with VEEDON FLEECE or HARD NOSE THE HIGHWAY.
"Magic Time" is one of the great romantic Morrison songs, though filled with a settled wisdom that age brings. "They Sold Me Out" is the usual screed from the Belfast crank and could have been left off. It just is completely impossible to identify with his grousing. He should carry on regardless. All in all, a very well crafted CD, finally. A classic? close enough. Maybe there is another NO GURU or CELTIC HEARTBEAT or AVALON SUNSET still in him. This is the first solid hopeful indication in a very long time that such inspiration still infuses his Irish soul.

Van Morrison does not disappoint with this new CD of his. The first time I heard it I knew I had to hear it over again-his voice is strong, soulful, and full of energy.

The album starts off with a certain soulful, tranquil and comfortable feel to it. The two songs, "Stranded," and "Celtic New Year," are both thoughtful and confident. There is an awesome guitar intro on "Celtic New Year" that sets the stage so well for this Irish blues song. In "Keep Mediocrity At Bay" Morrison's voice is full of energy alongside an upbeat musical arrangement. You know he's going to win his fight "for his rights"-and how's about that harmonica added on? SMILE I agree with critics who write that the song "This Love Of Mine" will remind you of crooners like Sinatra and Perry Como. Morrison is in this league and he proves it with this beautiful song! The song "I'm Confessin'" is an adorable love song and instantaneously catchy, too. "Lonely And Blue" is indeed bluesy with a distinct doo-wop element created by background vocal arrangements. The CD ends with the two tracks entitled "They Sold Me Out" and "Carry On Regardless"-how's about that intro on "Carry On Regardless?" These two songs are both soulful and very thoughtful. Morrison uses these songs to channel his scorn of the music industry.

Morrison uses background vocalists quite a bit on this album. Jerome Rimson, Liam Bradley, Johnny Scott, Siobhan Pettit, Olwin Bell, Aine Whelan and Karen Hamill all performed background vocals. A solid group!

All in all, this is a great CD for Van Morrison fans to rejoice with! It is on my shelf and we should value Morrison's work for being the talent that it is.

I have waited until the next release from Van Morriston before I review the last one even though I love Magic Time. Readers might wonder why I chose to do so.

When Magic Time came out I bought it on the first day and I loved it. All of it. Every single track. Not one doubt. I listened to it for weeks every time I was in the car and at home and, I still loved it. Then I began to read the other reviews. Even those who applaud it have some snide remarks about where Van is coming from or his choice of songs or his sincerity. One of my best friends who has liked Van for even longer than I have (and that is a long time) said he no longer listened to him because of his constant carping about the music business and "because he is a miserable old bugger". Quite.

Pay the Devil is a country album which I will be reviewing in the next few days. Getting back to Magic Time however, this is where I take issue with his supporters and detractors about the album. For many of us Van Morrison has two major qualities, his expression of the feelings and emotions that people express in R & B songs through his amazing voice, and the songs he writes a poet and composer.

This collection of songs covers many different aspects of blues and a variety of vocal expressions. I chose the title of this review from a Lovin' Spoonful song, one stanza of which goes like this...

"If you believe in magic don't bother to choose
If it's jug band music or rhythm and blues
Just go and listen it'll start with a smile
It won't wipe off your face no matter how hard you try
Your feet start tapping and you can't seem to find
How you got there, so just blow your mind"

and this particular quote captures everything you can say about this album. To meet one challenge head on, Van may write about his experiences in the music business and may have just cause. If it causes him pain, or his family or aspiring musicians, then he has a right to sing about it. It is a personal experience to him and his music is after all his expression. How he writes about it, how he sings about it, how he plays about it, how he accompanies about it is the thing we consume. Yes, we are entitled to our own opinions (and it is a free country isn't it?) but you know, a lot of us want to enjoy his music and to be frank I for one, do not care whether anyone else has views about Van Morrison and his life or not. I like his music.

Here endeth the diatribe. One of my favourite tracks is the gospel inspired "They Sold Me Out" a spiritual song about Jesus at the end of his life and the role of money, a strong metaphor for civil society in the West, and perhaps for how the artist feels about his career. Neil Young's last album had a strong nostalgic tone, but one very different from Van's. Whereas the Young album was a sugary tone this album is a bittersweet one. Celtic New Year is fantastic, with the vocal track as the lead instrument sustaining the song throughout and the clear enunciation of the words and the interwined instrumental accompaniment, he is certainly in superb form with such class and ease, rather like a Rolls Royce compared to a Ford.

To me, one of the great things about people who excel in performing the blues is that they sing or play about themselves to a large degree and you know that it is their feelings which lead to their capacity to express those through their music. Can't buy Me Love, sang the Beatles and there is much truth in that. Material success can make many things easier but we are still human after all. Look at Eric Calpton as an exemplar. Much of this album is a great expression and probably the reaon why I love it. Listen to the harmonica on Keep Mediocrity at Bay, or the impassioned plea for privacy on Just Like Greta. I don't know but sometimes I think that Van Morrison albums are not the culmination of a process but the start of one. You listen to the songs and you start to look into their meanings or you start to follow up on things like Greta Garbo's private life for instance.

One of the joys of this album is the sheer breadth of the subtleties of blues that Van uses to articulate his feelings. His vocal delivery is awesome throughout and the instrumentation reflects his obesession with perfection yet delivers the expression intact. I have no qualms either with some of the crooning. It is just another tool to express himself.

In summary it seems to me, as a mere consumer of music that Magic Time is an expression of Van Morrison feeling that he can express himself as he wishes. It is his freedom which is the magic time. My interpretation is that he no longer needs to satisfy anyone else about his work. So long as he is satisfied he can release the work to the world and say 'This is who I am". I applaud him for that. He is not someone who feels that he must churn out what the public desires or thinks they desire to stay at the top of his game. Magic Time is Enlightenment.

Like I said, I love this album. And, having played Pay the Devil several times, I love that one too. The next review will not be as long in coming.

I don't want to talk to the Van fans here. There are plenty of us, and we all already know that we want to own this CD. It's the people who don't know this that I want to talk to. I figure that there are literally millions of music fans who write Van off as the guy who recorded "Moondance" and "Brown Eyed Girl". Just to let you know, that's like saying Dylan is the guy who wrote "Blowin' in the Wind", or Muddy Waters is the guy who sang "Got My Mojo Workin'." Goddamn, you gotta pay attention to a guy like this, especially when he creates a great album.
"Stranded" and "Celtic New Year" kick off the disk and both are as hypnotically beautiful as anything I've ever heard in my life. A long time ago, Van figured out how to channel his muse in a way that is so pure and simple that it defies category. Little did we know at the time that "Astral Weeks" was only the first installment in a search for transcendence that would last Mr. Morrison (and through gracious good luck, us as well) a lifetime. "Magic Time" combines his obsession with music as therapy for the soul with his deep understanding of `soul' music (both the blues and the Celtic variety). He does both with a pure authority that, at its best, is unfettered by self-consciousness. We're talking about a man who can sing a standard blues progression and call it "Keep Mediocrity at Bay", then follow it with a blast of swinging blues that suggests Los Lobos on a really good day, called "Evening Train."
Sometimes, he aims wide and misses - "This Love is Mine" has the swagger of bad rat-pack swing, while "I'm Confessin'" has the same rat-pack vibe with an after-hours feel. I'd advise skipping these tracks if you want to maintain the mood, especially the latter, since it casts Van in the truly unflattering role of something resembling a strip show barker. The fact is, his is a restless soul, and he keeps challenging himself in a way that renders his misses simultaneously forgivable and weirdly fascinating. What matters is that he is willing to try, and his degree of artistic success surpasses virtually all of the competition, bare none.
So what if Van Morrison has released what seems like 100 albums so far? Who else has produced such a predictably good lifetime of material? And if you never bought a Van Morrison album before, I can tell you with some confidence that right now is as good a time to catch on as ever. If you do, then welcome to the club. A- Tom Ryan

Just about everybody on the planet at least knows the name Van Morrison. Who hasn't heard Moondance and Brown Eyed Girl a thousand times over the years? Unfortunately, there is a universe of incredible material this guy has released over the past 30+ years that is largely overlooked.

After some real hit and miss releases in the '90s, Van started to click again with his 1999 release "Back On Top". His 2003 release "What's Wrong With This Picture?" was perhaps one of his best in over a decade, but in retrospect was just laying the groundwork for this record.

Magic Time puts the rest of the pieces from "What's Wrong" together. Van sounds more comfortable on this album and his voice is as commanding as it has ever been. With this release, the rubber has finally hit the road. Let's hope the ride is just beginning again.

Songs like "Stranded" and "Celtic New Year" are what I look for and expect from Van Morrison. I don't even mind his jarring change of pace in "Keep Mediocrity At Bay" because there is more deep meloncoly waiting for me. This is serious, deep down sentiment and he poors it on, and I love it. It's no wonder that the "jacket cover" is dark with heavy shades of blue. It's always baffeled me how Van Morrison can touch those deep spots of emotion in me without violating my sensibilities. These songs quiet me and reach for an inner strength. It's magic.

Van Morrisons music always strikes me as someone who is homesick, when he was in the USA he wrote about green fields and childhood memories of Ireland, now that he's firmly back in his motherland he writes about...the same thing.
Anyway that is one of the charming aspects of Morrisons style, that kind of Celtic spirit that permeates. This is pretty much another one of those although in my opinion a cut above some other recent efforts. I like the tracks Just Like Greta and The Lion This Time Again. Of course being Van Morrison he has superb musicians backing him and the guitar contribution is particularly outstanding. For hardcore fans who wait with baited breath for what the man will do next it is probably a case of all too familiar, for those vaguely interested you might find this exceeds your expectations.

If you are a Van Morrison fan you will love this record. It is a wonderful recording with some swinging jazz tunes redone in Van's on way. there is not a bad cut on the record and it is full of the soulfull side of Van Morrison. I have recomended this record to a number of my friends. I have continued to play it repeatedly and enjoyed it a great deal. It represents all the good qualities of Van Morrisons music.
Alan

Three and a half stars really. Magic Time opens with the mellow Stranded that sets the tone for the album. The next one, Celtic New Year is a meandering ballad with jazzy touches. The tempo changes for the rhythmic and lilting Keep Mediocrity At Bay, a powerful message song.

Evening Train is a mild uptempo rock number with a jerky beat and engaging saxophone flourishes, whilst both This Love Of Mine and Gypsy In My Soul are lounge jazzy excursions, as is his rendition of the standard Lonely And Blue. Just Like Greta is a soulful ballad that expresses the yearning for solitude and The Lion This Time is a sad slow song with a melancholy undertone.

The title track, a relaxed ballad, is a celebration of happy memories, simple but moving. There is a mood of resignation in the face of betrayal in the bluesy piece They Sold Me Out. The album concludes with Carry On Regardless, a tuneful and rhythmic attack on the music business and the media.

Measured against Van Morrison's own brilliance, I suppose this album deserves three stars. But compared to a lot of other music, it merits four. Overall, I would say it lacks real passion. But then again, the lyrics and the melodies are good. The songs just don't grab you like his best work does. Still, Magic Time is essential for fans.

By rights, Van shouldn't be making records this great so far into his career, the law of diminishing returns being what it is...So few rock musicians keep their muse, their artistic mojo,intact...But this is just stellar material, chock full of that patented, ecstatic Van magic. And,if you're susceptible to that particular brand of magic (and why wouldn't you be?) you cannot go wrong with this.