Search - Van Morrison :: Into the Music (Mlps) (Shm)

Exquisite masterpiece enhanced

Pieter | Johannesburg | 05/01/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This uplifting album kicks off with the snappy Bright Side Of The Road and continues in the same powerful vein with the stirring Full Force Gale, a full throttled celebration of spiritual ecstacy. The beautiful violin is the hero on both Stepping Out Queen and the bucolic Troubadours, whilst Rolling Hills is a hypnotic Celtic ballad with a sing-along chorus.



You Make Me Feel So Free is a soulful love song with appealing sax infusions and Angelou, a passionate love song embellished with lovely snatches of violin and piano, demonstrates Van's vocal prowess. With its soaring melody, whoops, hollers and shimmering violin, And The Healing Has Begun is my personal favourite on this exquisite album. But the subdued It's All In The Game and the lengthy You Know What They're Writing About are brilliant too.



The two added tracks are alternate versions of Troubadours and Steppin' Out Queen, both longer than the originals. On this celebratory album the music is infused with happiness and a joyous spiritual quality. Into The Music is right up there with Van's acclaimed masterpieces like Tupelo Honey, Moondance and Hymns To The Silence."

SUPERB REISSUE!

RafuXo | Brazil, SC Joinville | 04/01/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"...Really without words! really a wonderful japanese reissue! In this time in SHM-CD, a new format, better than any other US reissue! buy this instead the US 2008 version!

The Price is Y2.800 japanese yene, aprox. USD30.00. all on HMV, or CD-JAPAN, amazon the price is a absurd!



"

4 1/2 stars. A sometimes overlooked gem

Docendo Discimus | Vita scholae | 02/24/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The first thing I checked when I picked up this album was the credits. Its immediate predecessor, 1978's "Wavelength", was marred by the addition of ugly 70s synthesizers, but they're mercifully completely absent from this 1979 chestnut.



"Into the Music" is vintage Van Morrison, a relaxed, swinging collection of songs, folk, rock, blues, R&B, jazz, and country all mixed together in the inimitable style of Mr Morrison.

But it is a bit harder, a bit edgier, a bit more focused than the two albums that preceded it, and the songs themselves have more substance. They may not jump off the laser beam and grab you the way Morrison's most lauded records do, but "Into the Music" is nevertheless as Van Morrison-like a Van Morrison-album as you could ever imagine!



And it is delightfully varied as well, and flawlessly arranged. The opener, "Bright Side of the Road", with its gritty harmonica riffing and clanging boogie piano, is one of the highlights of the album, one of Morrison's best R&B-songs in fact. "And the Healing has Begun" and "Troubadours" are elegant folk ballads, grand but never opulent. The masterfully arranged "Full Force Gale" is one of the most charming good-time-pop songs you'll ever hear. "It's all in the Game" is slow soul, "Steppin' Out Queen" is up-tempo soul. And "Rolling Hills" is pure, delightful Irish folk, a two-step, a pennywhistle and a violin.



"Into the Music" is a truly enjoyable collection of tasteful, rootsy music from one of the greatest-ever composer of popular music, perhaps the only songwriter besides Bob Dylan to constantly deliver the goods for over forty years. In a way, it is Morrison's first "latter-day" album, having more in common with recent albums like "Down the Road", "Back on Top", and "Keep it Simple" than with his mid-70s output.



Fans of George Ivan Morrison should not be disappointed by this; it may not be one of his most talked-about albums, but it is by far the best from this period in his career."