Category: Van Morrison

Picking up exactly where Beautiful Vision’s “Scandinavia” left off, “Higher than the World” unfolds amid a cascade of synthesizer, choppy R&B guitar, and the saccharine acknowledgment of higher consciousness that defined Van Morrison’s sonic pilgrimage of the 1980s. The third installment of what can be termed the Celtic Guru period, Inarticulate Speech of the Heart incorporates a softer edge to the sound that Van was building over the course of the decade.

The string of releases to follow Common One would serve as companions in staking out a New-Age Celtic spirituality built on channeling legacies as far flung as Jimmy Rogers, Ray Charles, Christmas Humphrey, and L Ron Hubbard. Critical as any of these to Van’s Celtic Guru years was an interpretation of Alice Bailey’s theosophy. The ideas were laid out on Van’s 1980 masterwork, but the seven rays never radiated as brightly as they did on Beautiful Vision.

Common One was the album Van Morrison had been trying to make for ten years. It would mark the furthest he had moved away from the sounds of Astral Weeks, while still maintaining the sonic and literary craftsmanship of the legendary session. The blues and soul records that shaped Morrison’s musical upbringing were still present. It was definitely a rock and roll record. And the astral folk leanings for which the critics had held on to the singer for so long, ran through the entirety of the nearly hour-long affair.