1001 Albums Summary

For some reason I’d always thought Supertramp were a sub-Bee-Gees, disco outfit, so now I feel a bit musically embarrassed. Still not sure it’s my bag though. Mark Twain said that “if you don’t like the weather in New England now, just wait five minutes”. I often feel the same way about prog, but in reverse. A song will start and you think it’s going to be amazing but then it goes on for too long and goes through so many changes that by the end it bares no resemblance to the song that you really liked at the beginning. This album had a bit of that going on. Didn’t hate it but just felt like it added up to less than the sum of its parts for me.

I’ve got a pretty superficial knowledge of Van Morrison and I’d never listened to this album before (although I knew a few of the tracks). Will definitely be going back to it again. Detected a bit of Belle and Sebastian on album closer ‘Glad Tidings’. Not sure whether Mr Morrison was influenced by the infant Stuart Murdoch, or it was the other way round (I’ll let the lawyers fight it out), but loved it either way. First album on the list that I’m genuinely glad I’ve heard before I die.

For me it was a bit meh. I got about half way through this album before I remembered that Cee-Lo Green features on ‘The Mouse and the Mask’ with Dangermouse and MF DOOM. Then I remembered how incredible that album is. Then I went and listened to that instead. Maybe the second half of this album is better than the first, but even if it is I still think I made the right choice. Cracking voice though, and I’m not sure Van Morrison’s ever been asked to appear on ‘The Masked Singer’, so he’s got that going for him.

Review accidentally uploaded under a different pseudonym - sorry!