drums, vibes and acoustic guitar, the odd string quartet and of course flute.”
Barney Hoskyns Mojo
A mix of folk music, jazz and stream of consciousness but ultimately in a music genre of its own, Astral Weeks (1968) is often considered one of the best albums ever made.
Astral Weeks
The 1968 title song featuring the opening lines of the album: “If I ventured in the slipstream between the viaducts of your dream”. His early voice was described as “flinty and tender, beseeching and plaintive”.
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His first album for Warner Bros. Records was Astral Weeks (which he had already performed in several clubs around Boston), a mystical song cycle, often considered to be his best work. Morrison has said, “When Astral Weeks came out, I was starving, literally.” Released in 1968, the album eventually achieved critical acclaim, but it originally received an indifferent response from the public. To this day, it remains in an unclassifiable music genre and has been described variously as hypnotic, meditative, and as possessing a unique musical power. It has been compared to French Impressionism and mystical Celtic poetry. A 2004 Rolling Stone magazine review begins with the words: “This is music of such enigmatic beauty that thirty-five years after its release, Astral Weeks still defies easy, admiring description.” Alan Light would later describe Astral Weeks as “like nothing he had done previouslynd really, nothing anyone had done previously. Morrison sings of lost love, death, and nostalgia for childhood in the Celtic soul that would become his signature.” It has been placed on many lists of best albums of all time. In the 1995 Mojo list of 100 Best Albums, it was listed as number two and was number nineteen on the
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