{"id":4949,"date":"2025-03-23T20:59:06","date_gmt":"2025-03-23T20:59:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.davidbelbin.com\/blog\/?p=4949"},"modified":"2025-03-25T13:30:22","modified_gmt":"2025-03-25T13:30:22","slug":"the-old-guys-martin-carthy-john-cale-van-morrison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.davidbelbin.com\/blog\/2025\/03\/the-old-guys-martin-carthy-john-cale-van-morrison\/","title":{"rendered":"The Old Guys: Martin Carthy, John Cale & Van Morrison"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I go to gigs most weeks. Every year there tends to be a week where I have several. This week, it was five (nearly six, as I originally planned to see Nadia Reid at The Bodega on Monday). That\u2019ll seem like overkill to some, but last year I was at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, where I would sometimes see five acts in a day, and I\u2019m a regular at Green Man festival, where I\u2019m likely to see even more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The week was bookended by shows from two bands whose front-men are 58, a few years younger than me: Mercury Rev\u2019s Jonathan Donohue at the Rescue Rooms and saxophonist\/band leader Tony Kofi at Peggy\u2019s Skylight. I\u2019ve seen both many times before. Each band was in great form. Tony’s had the great Pete Cater on drums and featured a second year conservatoire student called Olly Young on guitar. He had learnt the guitar parts for a Lou Donaldson tribute in less than 24 hours, when the regular guitarist had a bereavement, and did a fine job. Today, however I want to write about the middle three, who had a combined age of 245: Van Morrison, John Cale and Martin Carthy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I last saw Van at Nottingham\u2019s Royal Concert Hall some thirty years ago. I\u2019d been going to his shows since 1979, when I saw the same tour twice in a fortnight. The first time he was transcendent, the second, despite exactly the same setlist (bar my favourite song, St Dominic\u2019s Preview, which didn\u2019t help) and a better seat, he phoned it in. And so it continued. I saw two fantastic shows in Sheffield (my home town) and Nottingham with Georgie Fame, who seemed to bring out the best in him. But on the Enlightenment tour, he was lack-lustre, until he came back on for a half hour encore of new material, which was sublime. Then there was the nadir, a show where he handed what seemed like half the vocals to his support\/sidekick Brian Kennedy. I was in the middle of the second row and at one point I heard myself heckling. Van looked confused, he never got heckled. But he deserved it. I vowed never to go again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My will eventually broke. After all, that run of albums, from Astral Weeks through Veedon Fleece, is possibly the strongest consistent run from all the great 70s artists (Neil Young and Joni Mitchell just about equal it) and I thought I\u2019d like to see him one more time before he (and I) got too old. Van turns 80 this year. Actually, I bought tickets to see him last time he played Nottingham in 2019, only for Teenage Fanclub to announce a Rock City show. I sold my ticket on and I\u2019m glad I did, because it was the last time TFC\u2019s original line up played here, but that night Van played St Dominic\u2019s Preview, which I\u2019ve only heard him do the once. That said, reports did reach me that, overall, it wasn\u2019t a great show.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This time I didn\u2019t try to persuade anyone to come with me. It was the opening night of a short tour and my expectations were low. I forked out ninety quid for a good seat and found my place just before Van came on, five minutes early. His backing band had just played a short opening set and what a band they were, a stonking six piece plus two singers. Van had shrunk and looked, beneath his hat and shades, fairly trim. I didn\u2019t know the opening number, Only a Dream, but he followed it with the title track of his last good album, Back on Top, and it became clear that not only was he singing well, he was enjoying himself, feeling out the new band, happy with how it was going. Here\u2019s the setlist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Van, it turns out, has got past the period where his albums were going through the motions cover versions (or worse, lockdown rants) and written a set of new songs reminiscent of his best work, One of these, Down to Joy, he sang well. He didn\u2019t just sing. He played sax, a lot, and guitar, and harmonica. He even, for a powerful Vanhose Stairway, performed at the piano, only his hat visible to the audience. He pulled out songs I hadn\u2019t heard him do in 46 years, like Wild Night and Help me. And he encored, of course, with the first record of his I bought, Them\u2019s Gloria, leaving the band to vamp on for ten minutes after he\u2019d left the stage, having performed his regulation 90 minutes. Was he as good as I\u2019ve ever seen him? No, but he was the best I\u2019ve seen him in 35 years. I\u2019m very glad I went. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s a bit of Wild Night – right hand side of the stage only: the lady in front of me had big hair.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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