Van Morrison returns to Blue Note Records for a new studio album Born To Sing: No Plan B, to be released on October 2, 2012. Morrison previously released the Grammy-nominated What’s Wrong With This Picture? on Blue Note in 2003.
Van says: “With most record companies being so corporate I am happy to be working with Don Was and the team at Blue Note. To have such a creative music person as the head of my recording label assures me that all the effort taken to write and record this new album will be rewarded with a music-based focus and marketing approach. I look forward to many recording projects with Don and Blue Note.”
A six-time Grammy winner and member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Songwriters Hall of Fame, Morrison is one of the most influential artists of the modern age. His poetically impressionistic lyrics and unique fusion of rock ‘n’ roll with soul, jazz and folk have deep emotional resonance and universal appeal. His transcendent masterpieces Astral Weeks and Moondance are typically ranked among the best albums of all-time, while his more recent recordings Magic Time and Keep it Simple enjoyed Top 10 debuts.
Don Was adds: “Over a career that spans decades, Van Morrison has developed a body of work that is unparalleled in its consistent excellence. He is one of the greatest singer/songwriter/musicians of all time. We are incredibly honored that he has chosen to record for the Blue Note label and look forward to many fruitful years together.”
Born To Sing: No Plan B was produced by Van and recorded in his native Belfast.
Here’s the track listing for ‘Born to Sing: No Plan B’:
1. Open The Door (To Your Heart)
2. Going Down To Monte Carlo
3. Born To Sing
4. End Of The Rainbow
5. Close Enough For Jazz
6. Mystic Of The East
7. Retreat And View
8. If In Money We Trust
9. Pagan Heart
10. Educating Archie
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Here’s a look back at our recent thoughts on Van Morrison. Click through the titles for complete reviews …
VAN MORRISON – DOWN THE ROAD (2002): “Whatever happened,” Van Morrison, erstwhile pop singer, old-soul blues gypsy, entertainer-slash-provocateur, sings here, “to the way it’s supposed to happen? And whatever happened to me?” Much, in fact, has happened. Morrison, it’s worth noting, could have settled in as a fixture on pop music’s hit-machine dead end after scoring big with “Brown Eyed Girl” and the still-scrappy “Gloria,” bored us silly by lingering too long with the safe romance of “Have I Told You Lately?” or reversed field and hidden inside the retro-cool sounds of “Domino” and “Wild Night.” Morrison instead kept moving, kept adding elements — big-band horns, stream-of-conscious narrative, John Lee Hooker, Georgie Fame, textures from his mystic Celtic roots. “Down the Road,” as its name implies, finds Morrison in contemplative, if still biting, mood. He weaves in these many disparate threads — yet continues to growl with lasting authority. A return to form on par with 1991’s “Hymns to the Silence,” “Down the Road” is both an emotional and musical triumph — and it became Morrison’s highest-charting U.S. release since 1972’s “Saint Dominic’s Preview.”
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