• Voto:
Inafferrabile come l'inconscio, indefinibile come un flusso di pensieri a ruota libera. Come diceva Lucio Dalla, "Il pensiero, come l'Oceano, non lo puoi bloccare, non lo puoi recintare...", e quindi neanche catalogare.
Van Morrison è un vulcano di sensazioni allo stato puro, va dritto all'anima, sfugge ad ogni classificazione. È irlandese, ma fino agli anni '80 non farà mai uso redditizio del misterioso e fascinoso "colore celtico". Però quando deciderà di usarlo lo farà da maestro. La sua musica sembra piuttosto costruita su solidi pilastri blues, ma con un'interpretazione così personale di questo genere da stravolgerne completamente la metrica e i canoni, per arrivare ad un'anarchia quasi totale, ad una contaminazione con elementi jazz, folk e perfino classici.
Qualcuno per i suoi testi visionari ha scomodato antichi poeti irlandesi e non, qualcun altro lo ha visto come erede del leggendario bardo celtico. A me questa parola mi fa venire in mente il povero Assurancetourix, bardo ufficiale del villaggio gallico di Asterix, che ogni volta che si prova a strimpellare qualcosa viene regolarmente imbavagliato. Nulla di più lontano da Van Morrison, che si fa accompagnare in modo ineccepibile da strumentisti quadripalluti, in genere provenienti dal jazz, e che usa la sua tagliente voce di baritono in modo assai duttile, alternando il sussurro confidenziale ai toni dolenti del blues, con frequenti e fulminee impennate che lasciano sbalordito chi ascolta.
Dopo un breve periodo di gavetta, in cui viaggia tra la natia Belfast e gli USA, al secondo colpo sforna "Astral Weeks", capostipite di una lunga serie di capolavori, inciso nel 1968 in due soli giorni, eppure un miracolo di perfezione strumentale. Il brano omonimo, all'inizio, offre già un perfetto esempio della struttura dei blues irregolari di "Van the Man": procede a singhiozzi, senza strofe né ritornelli, per continue aggiunte di sensazioni, che il testo suggerisce e la musica disegna, con le entrate progressive di chitarra acustica, flauto e violino a duettare con la scarna base ritmica. Quando sfuma siamo già in trance e neanche ci si accorge che sono volati via 7 minuti.Stessa sensazione danno le due lunghe ballate che dominano la seconda parte: "Madame George" e "Ballerina". I loro temi sembrano monotoni, ma ipnotizzano e incantano: nella prima contribuisce lo struggente dialogo un po' coheniano tra chitarra acustica e violino, con il flauto che sembra insinuarsi negli spazi liberi; nella seconda, vaga immagine di donna degna delle icone femminili dylaniane, il fascino è dovuto alla punteggiatura quasi costante di un vibrafono tipicamente jazz. Altro gioiello è la lunga "Cyprus Avenue": qui il compito di rapirci è svolto da un insolito clavicembalo, che parte con semplici terzine, via via sempre più fitte, fino ad un accompagnamento di ricchezza barocca, come si conviene a questo strumento, tipico della musica sei-settecentesca.
Ma il viaggio più profondo nell'inconscio è "Beside You", un vero e proprio vortice creato dalle limpide note della chitarra acustica, dai magici giochi di un flauto da incantatore di serpenti e dai disperati vocalizzi di Van Morrison, che ci risucchia sempre più giù, nelle profondità del dolore umano. Si piange e si gode. Spezzano appena un po' la tensione due episodi più ingenui, più "anni '60", ma sempre ricchi di preziosismi: "Sweet Thing" e "The Way Young Lovers Do"; in particolare quest'ultima sfoggia brillanti fiati tipicamente soul.
Un altro breve gioiellino chiude il disco: "Slim Slow Slider". La voce sembra persa in un vuoto irreale, che a poco a poco si riempie grazie agli arabeschi di uno splendido flauto, ancora una volta grande protagonista. La chiusura un po' brusca di quest'ultima magia ci lascia a bocca aperta, con una voglia feroce di riascoltare questo disco sublime.
Elenco tracce testi e samples
01 Astral Weeks (07:06)
If I ventured in the slipstream
Between the viaducts of your dream
Where immobile steel rims crack
And the ditch in the back roads stop
Could you find me?
Would you kiss-a my eyes?
To lay me down
In silence easy
To be born again
To be born again
From the far side of the ocean
If I put the wheels in motion
And I stand with my arms behind me
And I'm pushin' on the door
Could you find me?
Would you kiss-a my eyes?
To lay me down
In silence easy
To be born again
To be born again
There you go
Standin' with the look of avarice
Talkin' to Huddie Ledbetter
Showin' pictures on the wall
Whisperin' in the hall
And pointin' a finger at me
There you go, there you go
Standin' in the sun darlin'
With your arms behind you
And your eyes before
There you go
Takin' good care of your boy
Seein' that he's got clean clothes
Puttin' on his little red shoes
I see you know he's got clean clothes
A-puttin' on his little red shoes
A-pointin' a finger at me
And here I am
Standing in your sad arrest
Trying to do my very best
Lookin' straight at you
Comin' through, darlin'
Yeah, yeah, yeah
If I ventured in the slipstream
Between the viaducts of your dreams
Where immobile steel rims crack
And the ditch in the back roads stop
Could you find me
Would you kiss-a my eyes
Lay me down
In silence easy
To be born again
To be born again
To be born again
In another world
In another world
In another time
Got a home on high
Ain't nothing but a stranger in this world
I'm nothing but a stranger in this world
I got a home on high
In another land
So far away
So far away
Way up in the heaven
Way up in the heaven
Way up in the heaven
Way up in the heaven
In another time
In another place
In another time
In another place
Way up in the heaven
Way up in the heaven
We are goin' up to heaven
We are goin' to heaven
In another time
In another place
In another time
In another place
In another face
02 Beside You (05:17)
Little Jimmy's gone way out of the back street,
Out of the window, into the falling rain,
Right on time, right on time.
That's why Broken Arrow waved his finger,
Down the road, so dark and narrow,
In the evening, just before the Sunday six-bells chime, six-bells chime
And All the dogs are barkin' way down on the garbage studded highway
Where you wander and you roam from your retreated view,
Way over on the railroad,
Tomorrow all the tipping trucks will unload together
Everywhere the scrapbooks built together stuck with glue
And I'll stand beside you, beside you,
Oh child, to never wonder why
To never, never, never, never wonder why at all
To never, never, never, never wonder why
It's gotta be, it has to be
Way across the country where the hillside mountains glide
The dynamo of your smile caressed the barefoot virgin child
To wander past your window in the lantern lit
You held it in the doorway and you cast against the pointed idle breeze
You said your time was open go well on your merry way
Past the praise and footlits of the silence easy
You breathe in, you breathe out
You breathe in, you breathe out
You breathe in, you breathe out
You breathe in, you breathe out
And you're high on a high-flying cloud
Wrapped up in your magic shroud, ecstasy surrounds you
This time it's found you
You turn around
You turn around
You turn around
You turn around
And I'm beside you
Beside you
Oh, darlin'
To never, never wonder why at all,
No, no, no, no, no,
To never, never, never, wonder why at all
To never, never, never, wonder why it's gotta be
It has to be
And I'm beside you
Beside you
Oh, child
To never, never, never, wonder why at all
I'm beside you
Beside you
Beside you
Beside you
Oh, child
03 Sweet Thing (04:25)
I will stroll the merry way
And jump the hedges first
And drink the clear
Clean waterfall to quench my thirst
And I shall watch the ferry-boats and they'll get high
On a bluer ocean
Against tomorrow's sky
And I will never grow so old again.
And I will walk and talk
In garden's all wet with rain.
Oh sweet thing, sweet thing
Oh my, my, my sweet thing.
And I shall drive my chariot
down you streets and cry
'hey its me, I'm dynamite and I don't know why'.
And you shall take me strongly in your arms again.
And I will not remember that I ever felt the pain.
We shall walk and talk
in gardens all misty wet with rain.
And I will never, never, never grow so old again.
Oh sweet thing, sweet thing.
My, my, my, my, my sweet thing.
And I will raise my hand up
into the night cloud's sky.
And count the stars shining in your eye.
Just to dig it all an' not to wonder that's just fine.
And I wil be satisfied
Not to read in between the lines.
And I will walk and talk in gardens all wet with rain.
And I will never ever, ever grow so old again.
Oh sweet thing. Oh sugar baby
Sugar baby, sugar baby, sugar baby.
With your champagne eyes
And your saint-like smile.
06 Madame George (09:45)
Down on Cyprus Avenue
With a childlike vision leaping into view
Clicking, clacking of the high heeled shoe
Ford & Fitzroy, Madame George
Marching with the soldier boy behind
He's much older with hat on drinking wine
And that smell of sweet perfume comes drifting through
The cool night air like Shalimar
And outside they're making all the stops
The kids out in the street collecting bottle-tops
Gone for cigarettes and matches in the shops
Happy taken Madame George
That's when you fall
Whoa, that's when you fall
Yeah, that's when you fall
When you fall into a trance
A sitting on a sofa playing games of chance
With your folded arms and history books you glance
Into the eyes of Madame George
And you think you found the bag
You're getting weaker and your knees begin to sag
In the corner playing dominoes in drag
The one and only Madame George
And then from outside the frosty window raps
She jumps up and says Lord have mercy I think it's the cops
And immediately drops everything she gots
Down into the street below
And you know you gotta go
On that train from Dublin up to Sandy Row
Throwing pennies at the bridges down below
And the rain, hail, sleet, and snow
Say goodbye to Madame George
Dry your eye for Madame George
Wonder why for Madame George
And as you leave, the room is filled with music, laughing, music,
dancing, music all around the room
And all the little boys come around, walking away from it all
So cold
And as you're about to leave
She jumps up and says Hey love, you forgot your gloves
And the gloves to love to love the gloves...
To say goodbye to Madame George
Dry your eye for Madame George
Wonder why for Madame George
Dry your eyes for Madame George
Say goodbye in the wind and the rain on the back street
In the backstreet, in the back street
Say goodbye to Madame George
In the backstreet, in the back street, in the back street
Down home, down home in the back street
Gotta go
Say goodbye, goodbye, goodbye
Dry your eye your eye your eye your eye your eye...
Say goodbye to Madame George
And the loves to love to love the love
Say goodbye
Oooooo
Mmmmmmm
Say goodbye goodbye goodbye goodbye to Madame George
Dry your eye for Madame George
Wonder why for Madame George
The love's to love the love's to love the love's to love...
Say goodbye, goodbye
Get on the train
Get on the train, the train, the train...
This is the train, this is the train...
Whoa, say goodbye, goodbye....
Get on the train, get on the train...
07 Ballerina (07:03)
Spread your wings
Come on fly awhile
Straight to my arms
Little angel child
You know you only
Lonely twenty-two story block
And if somebody, not just anybody
Wanted to get close to you
For instance, me, baby
All you gotta do
Is ring a bell
Step right up, step right up
And step right up
Ballerina
Crowd will catch you
Fly it, sigh it, try it
Well, I may be wrong
But something deep in my heart tells me I'm right and I don't think so
You know I saw the writing on the wall
When you came up to me
Child, you were heading for a fall
But if it gets to you
And you feel like you just can't go on
All you gotta do
Is ring a bell
Step right up, and step right up
And step right up
Just like a ballerina
Stepping lightly
Alright, well it's getting late
Yes it is, yes it is
And this time I forget to slip into your slumber
The light is on the left side of your head
And I'm standing in your doorway
And I'm mumbling and I can't remember the last thing that ran through my head
Here come the man and he say, he say the show must go on
So all you gotta do
Is ring the bell
And step right up, and step right up
And step right up
Just like a ballerina, yeah, yeah
Crowd will catch you
Fly it, sight it, c'mon, die it, yeah
Just like a ballerina
Just like a just like a just like a ballerina
Get on up, get on up, keep a-moving on, little bit higher, baby
You know, you know, you know, get up baby
Alright, a-keep on, a-keep on, a-keep on, a-keep on pushing
Stepping lightly
Just like a ballerina
Ooo-we baby, take off your shoes
Working on
Just like a ballerina
08 Slim Slow Slider (03:17)
Slim slow slider
Horse you ride
White as snow
Slim slow slider
Horse you ride
Is white as snow
Tell it everywhere you go
Saw you walking
Down by Ladbroke Grove this morning
Saw you walking
Down by Ladbroke Grove this morning
Catching pebbles for some sandy beach
You're out of reach
Saw you early this morning
With your brand new boy and your Cadillac
Saw you early this morning
With your brand new boy and your Cadillac
You're gone for something
And I know you won't be back
I know you're dying, baby
And I know you know it, too
I know you're dying
And I know you know it, too
Everytime I see you
I just don't know what to do
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Altre recensioni
Di Neu!_Cannas
Il dolore, il sentimento più strano e complesso, che racchiude un po’ tutti gli altri.
Questo disco è di una maestosità che non ha paragoni in musica stessa, non li ha mai avuti e mai li avrà.
Di tonysoprano
Si tratta di una agrodolce freccia che si conficca nei nostri deboli e sensibili cuori umani.
Probabilmente il mio pezzo preferito di Van Morrison, dove l’irlandese dichiara il suo mai rinnegato amore per la vita.
