Page "Van Morrison" Paragraph 33

With his next album, the new decade found Morrison following his muse into uncharted territory and merciless reviews.

In February 1980, Morrison and a group of musicians travelled to Super Bear, a studio in the French Alps, to record ( on the site of a former abbey ) what is considered to be the most controversial album in his discography ; later " Morrison admitted that his original concept was even more esoteric than the final product.

" The album, Common One, consisted of six songs, each of varying length.

The longest, " Summertime in England ", lasted fifteen and one-half minutes and ended with the words ," Can you feel the silence ?".

NME magazine's Paul Du Noyer called the album " colossally smug and cosmically dull ; an interminable, vacuous and drearily egotistical stab at spirituality: Into the muzak.

" Even Greil Marcus, whose previous writings had been favourably inclined towards Morrison, said: " It's Van acting the part of the ' mystic poet ' he thinks he's supposed to be.

" Morrison insisted that the album was never " meant to be a commercial album.

" Biographer Clinton Heylin concludes: " He would not attempt anything so ambitious again.

Henceforth every radical idea would be tempered by some notion of commerciality.

" Later the critics would reassess the album more favourably with the success of " Summertime in England ".

Lester Bangs wrote in 1982, " Van was making holy music even though he thought he was, and us rock critics had made our usual mistake of paying too much attention to the lyrics.