O2, Dublin
“NO PLAN B, no safety net.” Van Morrison doesn’t need either. At a sold-out O2 on Saturday night, Van the Man could be seen swinging from a precipitous musical scale, then dangling precariously on a single, delicate refrain, with nothing to break his fall. But Morrison walked the tightrope like a true musical acrobat.
There were no big screens or special effects – just Morrison and his band huddled on a bare stage, with soft lighting to illuminate the low-key scene. If you wanted a spectacle, you were in the wrong room. But if you wanted to hear some sweet jazz/soul/rb/blues from a still-potent veteran, you had come to the right place. Few of the crowd who listened raptly as Van delivered his musical masterclass wanted to be anywhere else at that moment.
This was Morrison's first Dublin gig in a decade, and it's clear from how quickly the concert sold out the fans were glad to have him back. It's also clear Van had lost little of his pinpoint precision, as he deftly conducted his band through a set featuring many of his best-known tunes, along with a few hand-picked covers, including Ray Charles's I Can't Stop Loving Youand It's All In the Game, a 1958 hit for Tommy Edwards. He's also lost none of his gruff, workmanlike approach to performance, going about his business with minimum fuss or ceremony. This is his job, after all, and thankfully, he still does it well.
Van didn’t strain himself trying to reach out to the 15,000-strong crowd – instead, he let the crowd come to him, trusting his musical instincts to keep the focus on the small but tightly woven group of musos onstage. The band may have been low-key, but they delivered on the musical prowess, providing just the right back-up of keyboard, trumpet, trombone, sax, electric and acoustic guitars, percussion, bass and drums.
There were no backing vocalists to sweeten the pudding – it all rode on Van's larynx, and he was well up to the task, building from throaty whisper to full-bodied bark, and showing his mastery of the arpeggiated vocal line. "No guru, no method, no teacher," he intoned during one of the evening's highlights, In The Garden, and the crowd fell silent like attentive pupils gleaning precious wisdom from the master.
The set list should have satisfied most Van fans, and included such classics as Tupelo Honey, Crazy Love, Moondanceand Have I Told You Lately. There were also a few delightful surprises, such as Ballerina, from Astral Weeks. His daughter, Shana Morrison, who was the support act, joined her dad onstage for Sometimes We Cry, and returned later to help on Ben E King's Stand By Meand Gloria, by Van's old band Them. Alas, Van's voice had to concede defeat on that last one, but the band took up the baton and brought the classic riff to a rousing finale. At 66, Van's still the man to beat.
