Van Morrison Solo Acoustic - RTE Television ‘Talk About Pop’ Dublin IRELAND 1973 | Big O

VAN MORRISON

Dublin 1973 [no label, 1CD]
Talk about Pop, RTE Television Studios, Dublin, Ireland; November 2, 1973 (broadcast November 9, 1973). Very good TV broadcast.

Thanks to Big O.

Notes:

Here’s something very interesting by Van Morrison. As far as I know, it’s the one and only time he’s given a solo acoustic performance, and it happened when he was young and in his musical prime. It was done for a short-lived Irish TV show called “Talk about Pop,” in late 1973.

The good news is that a very good sounding bootleg recording of this performance exists. There was no audience, so that helps the sound quality. The song list is also interesting. He played some songs that didn’t get released at the time, like “Drumshanbo Hustle” and the cover “The Wild Side of Life.” Plus, he did some very rare songs, like “I Shall Sing,” which he always did with a big band including horns.

The bad news is that there was considerable dialogue between Morrison and a TV host between songs, and there doesn’t seem to be any audio of that. However, there’s a transcript of most of it.

The other bummer is the last two songs - “Snow in San Anselmo” and “Beside You” -  didn’t make it to the bootleg either. They were the last two songs played, and perhaps the performance ran too long for the length of the TV show. By that still leaves 45 minutes of Morrison’s only “unplugged” performance.

+ + + + +

Track 01. Wild Children 4:20
Track 02. Slim Slow Slider 3:12
Track 03. Warm Love 3:19
Track 04. Drumshambo Hustle 3:38
Track 05. Autumn Song 4:02
Track 06. St Dominic’s Preview 5:52
Track 07. Purple Heather 3:47
Track 08. Madame George 7:15
Track 09. Wild Side of Life 2:16
Track 10. I Shall Sing 2:47
Track 11. And It Stoned Me 3:45

Track 12. Piano intro [cut] 0:38 

Early enough to be of interest pre-irritating reactionary right wing old nut job! This is lovely actually and really listenable  . . . . . . worth remembering that this is contemporary with It’s Too Late To Stop Now perhaps one of the finest live recordings ever IMHO

Van here . . . . . .

To make up for the lack of dialogue from the Irish TV show here Van and band members that same year in conversation with Bob ‘Bomber’ Harris (OGWT) and see whether you think he’s “tired”!