Van Morrison - Astral Weeks
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Written By: Moti Kupfer
Album review - Van Morrison - Astral Weeks
Release date - 29.11.68
Label - Warner Bros.
Genre - Folk rock / Folk jazz
At first, I thought he was making up the words and the song as he went along. The second time, I discovered another layer and began to hear the melody. By the third time, I understood that there was something extraordinary here, and in general Van Morrison revealed to me a depth in music I had never known.
Kevin Rowland, the singer of the band "Dexys Midnight Runners", has no doubt about the genius of "Astral Weeks", Van Morrison’s second album, released on November 30, 1968.
George Ivan Morrison was born in Northern Ireland in August 1945 and raised as a Protestant Christian in East Belfast. Morrison said that by the age of one people were already calling him Van as a nickname, and it stuck. His mother was an amateur singer, and his father was a shipyard worker who collected jazz and blues records as a hobby. Morrison mentioned that he inherited his father’s taste and his mother’s musical talent. His father’s record collection exposed him to musical genres and artists like Muddy Waters, Mahalia Jackson, Charlie Parker, Woody Guthrie, Hank Williams, and Jimmie Rodgers.
At age three, he was already changing records on the old phonograph. Morrison expressed his admiration to Ray Charles, Lead Belly, and Solomon Burke. These artists gave him the inspiration and the strength to move forward, even in the toughest times. Without their music, he said, he would not have done what he accomplished over the next forty years.
In the ened, Van Morrison has had an exceptionally prolific musical career. His first solo album came out in 1967, and by 2025 he had released no fewer than 47 albums.
For many years, Van Morrison worked washing windows and stairwells, even after releasing early records that later became cornerstones of modern music, though at the time they provided no financial security.
His father bought him his first acoustic guitar at age 11, and he learned to play basic chords from the songbook "The Carter Family Style" edited by Alan Lomax.
At 15, Morrison left his parents’ home hoping to pursue a musical career. He played in several skiffle and rock and roll bands, and in 1964 he founded the rock band "Them" together with Eric Wrixon, who later became a founding member of "Thin Lizzy". The band had several hits, but Morrison left in 1966 after a United States tour because he was unhappy with the growing use of studio musicians.
Morrison was almost ready to give up his music career until Bert Berns, the producer of "Them", convinced him to record a solo album for Bang Records.
From those sessions the hit "Brown Eyed Girl" came out, but because Morrison was tied to a very bad contract, he did not earn even minimal profit from it.
Eventually, Berns released Van Morrison’s first solo album without permission and before it was finished, and the tension between them grew significantly. Morrison hated his first album. He said it came out with terrible sound quality, and was released without his approval.
After Berns died of a heart attack in late 1967, Morrison became entangled in conflict with Berns’s widow, who accused him of being responsible for her husband’s death. Because he was still under contract with "Bang Records", Morrison was effectively blacklisted by recording studios, and most clubs avoided booking him out of fear of clashing with the widow of Bert Berns, who was known for her connections to the criminal underworld.
Eventually, "Warner Bros." bought Morrison’s contract from "Bang Records" for 20,000 dollars in cash in a deal carried out in an abandoned warehouse on Ninth Avenue in Manhattan. Another harsh clause required Van Morrison to deliver 36 original songs within a year to Berns’s publishing company. He recorded them all in one session on an untuned guitar with lyrics about subjects ranging from ringworm to sandwiches. Ilene Berns considered the songs to be nonsense and never used them.
He created his second album, "Astral Weeks", exactly the way he wanted. It feels like a small rock opera with an internal logic and an evolving story, an album with a unique language of its own.
The music blends folk, blues, jazz, and classical elements, marking a radical departure from the sound of Morrison’s earlier pop hits.
Lewis Merenstein, the producer of "Astral Weeks", brought Van Morrison to New York, where the album was recorded over just three days. Surrounded by experienced jazz musicians, Morrison formed a chemistry built on almost blind understanding between them. He gave them full freedom to play, improvise, and explore, and the strong connection between the musicians and the singer became one of the defining characteristics of "Astral Weeks".
The songs on the album flow into one another like a single long piece, forming an intangible narrative of unreachable worlds. The album contains meditative pieces that weave themes of nostalgia, drama, and mysticism, embracing symbolism that would later become central in Morrison’s songwriting. It draws parallels between earthly love and heaven and comes as close as a living person can to that ideal.
The album opens with "Astral Weeks", which Morrison describes as a song where one can see the light at the end of the tunnel. During the song he mentions Lead Belly, one of his greatest inspirations.
Later, Morrison sings love songs to his partner and children, looking at things from the outside without attributing them personally to himself ("Beside You", "Sweet Thing").
In "Cyprus Avenue", Morrison recalls the street in Belfast where he longed to live as a child, a place full of wealth. “It wasn’t far from where I was brought up and it was a very different scene. To me it was a very mystical place. It was a whole avenue lined with trees and I found it a place where I could think.”
Later, Morrison sings about a teenager’s first kiss ("The Way Young Lovers Do") and then drifts into mythical reflections in "Madame George", a character composed, he says, of six or seven different people. The song’s original title was "Madame Joy". Even Morrison himself could not commit to the character’s true identity, though he believes his aunt Joy is somehow connected to it.
The album cover photograph was taken by Joel Brodsky, best known for his iconic “Young Lion” portrait of Jim Morrison. The circle and square on the cover symbolize the mystical emblem of the union of opposites, the sacred connection between sky and earth.
Critics loved the album, but the wider public remained indifferent to the masterpiece. Morrison said that to the people around him he was a successful artist, but his bank manager thought otherwise, he still had to keep washing windows.
For Listening: Spotify, Apple Music
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