release date: Sep. 1987
format: cd (1998 remaster)
[album rate: 4 / 5] [3,86]
producer: Van Morrison
label: Exile / Polydor - nationality: Northern Ireland, UK
Track highlights: 1. "Spanish Steps" - 2. "The Mystery" (4 / 5) - 3. "Queen of the Slipstream" - 4. "I Forgot That Love Existed" - 5. "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child" - 7. "Someone Like You" - 8. "Alan Watts Blues" - 10. "Did Ye Get Healed?" (5 / 5)
17th studio album by Van Morrison following 14 months after No Guru, No Method, No Teacher originally released on Mercury follows closely the same stylistic formula as found on the predecessor, although, with Van Morrison nothing is exactly as before. The album is unique in more than one sense. For a start, it contains three instrumentals (tracks #1, #6, and #11), and then there's a stronger tone of jazz all over the album. One more thing is that Morrison is normally credited vocals, at times guitar, more seldom piano parts, but here, he also plays the saxophone much more than, probably, on any other of his many studio albums, which is shame 'cause he does that with the same touch and elegance as when playing his most renowned instrument.
The album is one of his warmest and most sentimental studio albums, and he performs with mature finesse. The album is yet another fine release from Van the Man.
[ allmusic.com 4 / 5 ]
