I’ve been out on the deck, trying not to die of heatstroke, and this wonderful record has looped out of the house on repeat and made everything copacetic. It’s A Period Of Transition, an album that constantly gets relegated to the “meh” stack but hit the mood perfectly. Its easy, loping funk grooves, “in the pocket” ensemble playing, and a gorgeous Norlins production from Dr. John (also ivories), makes for the perfect lazy afternoon shade listen. And there’s a small handful of top tier tuneage: Flamingos Fly, Cold Wind In August, and [YOUR CHOICE HERE].
Not helped by dismal “this will have to do” cover art and title, and coming three years after the masterpiece Veedon Fleece, it was something of a disappointment, although it sold respectably. Listened to today, it sounds just perfect, and I love it.
A perfect cue for this clip of Van, Dr John. Mick Ronson and Mo Foster playing live in the Netherlands in 1977.
Main problem is the title, I mean it sounds like it is going to be a shit album. But it actually was transitional, moving away from esoteric Veedon Fleece to the more commercial Wavelength and Into the Music.
Yup. Imagine if it was called Flamingos Fly, with a suitably Norlins heatwavey photograph.
Wasn’t the title born of the photographic shoot that appears on the cover?
Apparently so. It was intended to be a “Many Moods Of …” kind of deal, with the last shot being a smile of contented acceptance that the Many Moods were transitional in nature. The great problem here being that Van looks pissed off in every shot, and mildly grumpy in the last.
The concept was his own, according to All music…
A personal favourite. Crack band just having a good time. Perfect dinner cooking music.
I reach for JM’s Solid Air whenever the mercury reaches 30.
And a Magnum Classic.
I presume by Magnum Classic you are referring to the brand of ice cream, not a magnum of Chianti Classico…..
I’m definitely low-brow, so bring on the Unilever…
I assume the Magnum classic is Chase The Dragon – which reached 17 in the UK album charts in 1982.*
* according to Wikipedia.
Was my favourite album ever for a short while!
I just gave it a quick listen. It’s better than their Smell The Glove album that’s for sure.
Yeah – great album.
I love the way that “The Eternal Kansas City” opens with the line “Excuse me, do you know the way to Kansas City” sung twelve times in a row. Magic!
Irony, duco01?
Or are you weeping openly at the beauty?
He’s not, I’m sure, being “ironic”. Nor weeping openly. It is a fantastic opening for the song.
It seems ironic, however, that HP seems to have had a humour failure on the subject of Van, a Man noted for his sunny disposition and pawky humour!
Porky disposition, and I’d concur.
The only Van Morrison “jokes” I’m aware of are the Brown Harmonica and the High Kick Attempt, but if there are others please do share!
There are only two categories of people.
Those who don’t like Van and those who’ve
yet to meet him
Arf!
Excellent humour-adjacent content!
In the land of a thousand dancers, I danced with you.
This LP has always been a favourite here too, it belongs squarely in his golden period.
I was going through my letters and I came across a picture postcard of the Reeperbahn.
Top flight band, fabulous lyrics and a great live in the studio sound throughout.
[YOUR CHOICE HERE] = Heavy Connection.
Joyous Sound is another fine track
Comments as good to hear as the music.
Wikipedia quotes Greil Marcus : dismissed the songs as “a lot of neo-R&B huffing and puffing” and said “Morrison’s performances rarely find a focus, almost never hit a groove…
I mean it almost guarantees that it is a good album. Ok Marcus wrote the book Mystery Train which was pretty good. And “ what is this shit” was a memorable review but how much stuff has he dissed that was clearly worthy stuff?
Marcus, like all Rolling Stone reviewers, is a dick from Dicksville, with a Master’s in Dickology from Dickburg University. Almost never hit a groove? The entire album is one gorgeous, fat groove from beginning to end. And it’s short so you don’t have to wait before spinning it again. Of all Morrison’s albums, this is possibly the easiest to listen to – in a good way.
My hat, HP – you almost make me want to listen to it!
Well, you managed it, HP – you got me to listen to a Van Morrison.
I really enjoyed that album – are there any more with that kind of feel to them?
@fitterstoke – I’d go on to Wavelength next.
You’re pretty safe with anything on The Brothers Warner.
Well, you say that, HP – but Astral Weeks is on Warner and I’ve never liked it.
Cheers, @Vulpes-Vulpes – HP seems to have left me to my own devices.
My long-held dislike of Van is largely based on the whole Celtic mystic stuff – I never liked Astral Weeks and everybody kept telling me it was a masterpiece, so I kinda gave up on him. Odd tracks I’ve heard here and there haven’t impressed me. But I really liked that Transition album.
@fitterstoke
There are a couple of albums that are pretty light on the Celtic stuff – principally the ones he made when living in CA. Personally I’d go for Wavelength (1978), which immediately followed A Period Of Transition(’77). The one after that called Into The Music has some great songs, starting to ease him in the direction of the following album Common One (’80) – and to my mind that next one is his greatest work after Astral Weeks, so maybe you don’t want to go there. Junior’s suggestion, almost a decade earlier than all of the above, is also a fine record, and carries more echoes of his earlier R&B years from before Astral Weeks and Moondance which preceded it – punchier, somewhat shorter songs – though Van himself doesn’t rate it highly, but what the heck does he know; I’ve heard him play Domino live many times since.
Thanks for that, VV.
I don’t know why AW doesn’t do it for me. I’ve tried a few times but I just don’t like it. And, if you’re told repeatedly that it’s his masterpiece and one of the classic albums of modern times (etc, contd pg 94) you start to think that you won’t like anything else by him, ie it must be all down hill from there. Clearly not true – but I wouldn’t have known where to begin, had HP not started this thread, and Junior and yourself not come up with further suggestions.
I’ve said it before, but I won’t let that stop me. I’ve tried many times with AW, and the only time it ever clicked was when I was monumentally hungover. Since I haven’t had more than two glasses of plonk in 15 years, I have no idea when I will next try AW.
@fitterstoke
You should definitely give Veedon Fleece a go. Much better than AW.
Surely one of the best live albums ever, Too Late To Stop Now is another one to look out for.
Easily accessible via YT, the Pacific Heights Radio Broadcast bootleg from a year or so earlier is every bit as good and contains arguably the best ever cover of Dylan’s Just Like A Woman.
Anything after 1997’s Healing Game is best avoided, Im(ns)ho
Many thanks, Jaygee
and Tupelo Honey, and St. Dominics, and (contd. Pg. 94)
@fitterstoke
Maybe band and the street choir.
Cheers, Junior.
I like it, and neo-R&B huffing and puffing is a pretty good description of Van’s work. On a similar tack, I never know why Hard Nose the Highway gets such short shrift. Again, the cover art doesn’t help. But Snow in San Anaelmo, Tge Great Deception. Sublime stuff.
One notable critic, he who is never (always) Wrong, thinks Hard Nose The Highway is Van’s finest album even if apparently Van hates it. (please note I don’t rate HP’s version – stick with the original)
https://falsememoryfoam.blogspot.com/2021/02/fridays-child.html
I’m pleased you don’t “rate” “my” version, Lodey, as it gives me confidence that Van (whose “version” it is – this is the original – my input is a guess at the running order) got it right before the label stepped in and chucked half of it away.
Van wanted a double, record company said no and got out the trimmer. Me thinks the company called it correctly, the artist is not always Right. I should add, reverentially, that your detective work was first class.
*folds arms, turns head away, blinking wetly*
It’s too late, Lodey. This is just … *snurfle* … one betrayal, yes, betrayal too far, even for you. I’ve stopped feeling … well, anything, really … it’s just, you know, this is so you, isn’t it? And please can you stop playing with that Scalextric, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD can we not talk any more?
Hated Scalextric. Line up the cars and away we go. Or not. One car refuses to move, the other hurtles off at the first corner before impaling itself in the wall. Two repair hours later, repeat.
A perfect metaphor for life, for any growing lad…
Scalextric was not a toy for the hamfisted, the inept, or the impatient. So why you ever had one is a mystery, Lodes. It was the greatest toy I ever had – even beating out Lego (when the Illuminated Brick was as hi-tech as it got), and many Saturdays were passed with chums coming round with their own sets and cars, building unlikely circuits that passed over Sofa Cushion Mountain and winding through Table Leg Chicane. Technical problems like connectivity were swiftly and expertly dealt with, and spinoffs the punishment for reckless driving.
I see you as being happier with Stretch Armstrong, or perhaps some Silly Putty?
It’s raining. It’s always raining. Peer through the window. A wee boy sits alone in front of a Totopoly board. Watch him roll the die and say “Hard luck, Archie. Your turn, Hamish”. He hands the die to his imaginary friend. Tiptoe quietly away.
Totopoly was actually pretty good. I also had a beautiful Pirate’s Treasure (???) board game, with little ships you had to fill up with gold bars and barrels of rum and whatnot. Magic Robot was shite, though, a game for know-alls and swots. I used the robot as target practice for my pea shooter.
1. “Re: “a beautiful Pirate’s Treasure (???) board game”.
Hmmm … the version of that game that I remember was called “Buccaneer”, I think.
https://boardgamegeek.com/image/430407/buccanee
2. I knew “silly putty” as “potty putty”. This seems to have been an alternative name.
Buccaneer! That’s the one. “Silly Putty” is, I think, the American version.
When I were a lad, we had to make do with plasticine
Aye. An’ rock ‘ard it was. Gert big lumps of rock’ ard brahn plasticine like rusty cannonballs. You could find fossils in some of ’em what broke apart. Tiny Airfix soldiers, my mate said.
Always had a deep dislike of Green and San Anselmo. Purple Heather on side 2 on the other hand is wonderful.
So often we agree, Junior – don’t know if you’ve noticed. But I like Green and can listen easily to San. And Purple Heather as you do say is a corker.
I have noticed that. Don’t know why but those songs have bugged from the first time I heard them and that was before Kermit’s Green.
Van has had some horrible album covers in his career (Sense of Wonder, Astral Weeks Live) but it would be fully 47 years before he came up with something to top Hard Nose (that cover being Latest Record Project).
His subsequent three of four run of albums have set new standards of aesthetic awfulness with an unbroken run of “Will-this-do?” clip art sleeves
He has form in shit titles, too. We’ve become so used to Astral Weeks that we no longer see what a shit title it is. Wavelength? Oh, okay. But Into The Music sounds like a K-tel compilation. Nine albums in the eighties, nine shit titles. And so on.
Lucky he can sing eh?
Especially when you consider he apparently has no Plan B
He can (well, could) not only sing – one of the greatest white soul singers ever – but write and produce/arrange, too. A monster talent. Shame it never made him happy.
“Poetic Champions Compose” is my write-in for Worst Ever Album Title Ever. And cover, too. No mean achievement.
‘Twas a reference to his noughties album Born to Sing: No Plan B. I suspect that you’d given up on him by that point – a lot of us had
Ye-es, Jaygee. I listen to all his new releases – once.
Hard Nose The Highway is fabulous. And that cover? Brilliant. I grew up buying Moody Blues LPs with covers by Phil Travers, who obviously influenced Rob Springett, the illustrator in question. I love the allusive imagery and the odd collage juxtaposition of its elements. My A level Art tutor twigged my efforts to replicate that same effect.
Of course, that cover, in turn, obviously influenced a certain author, given that the little guy in the hat on the front looks just dead right for a certain gnomic Buddhist guru.
I love the art, too (Springett did a few Herbie albums) and as you say there’s a nice Moody Blues vibe to it. But it sits as unhappily on the man as that sateen Elvis jumpsuit. I think his problem is he has no visual suss at all, just not Clue One as to what looks right and good.
(You get an I-Spy badge for Old Guy!)
This is “potato” quality, with pixels the size of bathroom tiles, but it’s the idea that matters. Taken from existing cover: Van leaning on table. Only here it’s a Norlins bar. Hand tinting. And the mood is perhaps daydreaming, with the new title acting as ironic counterpoint to his earthbound enclosure, with the suggestion of prison bars at the window. But you glommed all this already, because you’re a sensitive, bookish type.
Hubes – any chance of an AI “solution”? Not happy with mine.
AI art is still in its “Fucking Awful” stage, so let’s not, eh?
Exactly. I tried improving HP’s pic using my computer’s AI and it came up with this. I don’t think it’s much of an improvement. In fact, I actually prefer HP’s original pic in some ways.
@h-p-saucecraft
Daydreaming? He’s obviously still seething at the wrongs Bert Berns done him
This is in every way an improvement on my attempt and the original. The stark simplicity of line lends it a primitive urgency, a graphic virility of line that recalls Dadaist semiological experiments informed by the New York School of abstract impressionism. At once advanced, forthright, and signifficant, Gary’s game-changing masterpiece reinvents a populist “avant garde” as compelling force for change.
Alas I’m on holiday and my Internet access is very limited in what I can do I can’t even see your or Gary’s attempts.
Normalish service will have to wait.
Sorry.
No worries, Hubes, I can describe them for you: HP’s pic relies heavily on light and shade, colour and texture, fusing soft glows with incandescent pathos. Think Edward Hopper meets Caravaggio. Mine has a less self-conscious energy to it, an almost atavistic quality.
You’re selling yourself short, Gar – see my comment above.
Sorry it’s late but here’s your AI album cover as requested@H.P.Saucecraft.
This, for me, is Art. And not garfunkel.
Can an avatar be atavistic? Can you have an avataric ataravista?