Greil Marcus finished an article about the reception of his recent book on Van Morrison with this lovely quote:
Not all the stories people tell about Morrison, though, are stories of conflict, confusion, resentment, or regret. “I was talking to my father today,” a woman in Portland said. “He asked what I was doing tonight, and I told him to was going to hear someone talk about a book he’d written on Van Morrison. ‘Oh, Van Morrison!’ he said. ‘You know, I used to work with his father on the docks in Belfast. After work he’d take me to his house to listen to his records. I’d never seen anything like it. Hundreds and hundreds of 78s and LPs, jazz, blues, country music, everything. And there’d be the little boy there, dancing around the room, saying play that, Daddy! Play that!'” [Listening to Van Morrison by Greil Marcus]
Off-topic but nice: I will follow up with another post on music in a day or two …
Greil’s book was called Listening to Van Morrison in the UK and When that rough god goes riding: listening to Van Morrison in the US.
