Van Morrison - BBC Sessions, Volume 7: In Concert, Waterfront Hall, Belfast, Ireland, 1997 | Albums That Should Exist

Van Morrison - BBC Sessions, Volume 7: In Concert, Waterfront Hall, Belfast, Ireland, 2-3-1997

Paul says: Here's another Van Morrison BBC album. This time, it's a concert from 1997.

I'm not a big fan of Morrison's music in the 1980's, where he leaned more into New Age sounds with more overt Christian messaging. But in my opinion he rebounded in the 1990s, with more of a focus on rootsy R&B and jazz. His renaissance continued with the album "The Healing Game," released in April 1997. A Rolling Stone Magazine article in 2019 listed the album as one of his ten best, the only album on that list from after 1980.

Although this concert took place a couple of months prior to the release of that album, he already was playing songs from it: "Fire in the Belly," "Rough God Goes Riding," "If You Love Me," "Sometimes We Cry," "Burning Ground," and "The Healing Game."

This album has two sources. The first ten songs are from a BBC radio broadcast, which was also filmed and shown on TV. Apparently, it's not just from February 3, 1997. There are some songs from February 2nd, but I don't know which is which. Luckily for us, in the filming of this concert, there were some outtakes that leaked to the public. I found those on YouTube, and added them in as the last four songs. The song order for the whole thing is scrambled compared to the actual order performed in concert, so I just stuck those four at the end. 

Overall, the sound quality is excellent. However, one of the extra songs, "Tupelo Honey - Why Must I Always Explain," was suddenly cut off before the song ended. Luckily, the song dropped off to a near end about ten seconds prior to that. Probably it would have built back up before finishing. But I just cut it off at that point, and then added in some cheering from the end of other songs to give it more of a natural sounding ending. 

This album is an hour and 18 minutes long. 

01 Days like This 
02 Fire in the Belly 
03 Rough God Goes Riding 
04 Into the Mystic 
05 Sometimes We Cry 
06 Enlightenment 
07 It Once Was My Life
08 If You Love Me 
09 The Healing Game 
10 See Me Through - Soldier of Fortune - Burning Ground 
11 The Waiting Game
12 Ain't That Lovin' You, Baby
13 Vanlose Stairway 
14 Tupelo Honey - Why Must I Always Explain 

largely because I so agree with Paul here and didn’t enjoy the Christian messaging in his eighties work but here . . . . . .the return to form echoes those of our Bobby’s recovery from a time when those took advantage of the vulnerable . . . . like they so often do! 

Enjoy!

Van Morrison Pro Footage Outtake part 1, Vanlose Stairway Belfast, Feb 1997

2 shows were filmed at  the  Waterfront Hall , Belfast  on 2nd and 3rd February 1997 , for use as a Promotional film  for Van`s latest album The Healing Game.

A film was released called Back On The Corner, featuring a mix of songs from the two nights.

This is one of a series of Outtakes, not used in the final cut.

Van Morrison – vocals, acoustic guitar, harmonica

Haji Ahkba – flugelhorn

Robin Aspland – piano

Alec Dankworth – double bass

Geoff Dunn – drums, percussion

Pee Wee Ellis – soprano and baritone saxophones, background vocals

Georgie Fame – Hammond organ, background vocals

Leo Green – tenor saxophone, background vocals

Matt Holland – trumpet, background vocals

Ronnie Johnson – electric guitar

Brian Kennedy – background vocals

Katie Kissoon – background vocals

 Ralph Salmins – percussion

Nicky Scott – bass guitar