http://vanmorrisonnews.blogspot.com/?wid...1193200000
Taylor Hicks
Q: Who is the one artist you would love to record a duet with?
A: "Van Morrison. . . . I haven't (met him). I would love to. Just as a fan it would be cool. It's Too Late To Stop is a great album. I'm into masterpieces because hopefully I'll write one one day.
Cool website! New album out in March
Taylor is listed with some impressive company here!
Does Van update his blog more often than Taylor does?
What a small world!
"He has this great poetic...and fantastic voice...and what I love about Van, and what I forget to do sometimes is, well...I can tell when Van is just like drifting into sort of a zone...he just drifts into a place where the whole world is shut out and you can tell that he's in that spot. It's almost a dream-like, trance-like state, singing sometimes. That's really what music is all about. It's almost a jazz concept if you know what I mean...you just kinda go out and you're just...wingin' it...and I love that about Van, he will risk that, he will go on and on and on...and he won't fade the ending before the magic happens, as it were." Interview on Later with Bob Costas.
This is what
Bob Seger said about Van Morrison (and found on same blog)....I gave Taylor a copy of this Bob Costas interview with Bob Seger on DVD at the Hampton M&G. Seger rarely did interviews and this one was 45 minutes long! I wanted Taylor to hear what Bob said about Van because his description of
"zone" and "trance" and "wingin' it" and "magic happens" can all describe Taylor. Amazing! 
Someday I hope I get the chance to ask Taylor if he ever played the DVD interview (on the bus maybe?).
((cant sleep tonight...too much on my mind))...
Maybe Taylor's 3rd CD can be a "true" duets album...where instead of merly "covering" the songs of other artists and heroes...Taylor can actually "co-write" songs with his I-Tune Favorites...
I tend to like the later VM pieces...like the one Rod Stewart covered..."Oh the morning sun in all its glory...you fill my heart with gladness, take away my saddness...ease my troubles...thats what you do." Pure Irish poetry...about more than what most people understand it to be about...
Does Van update his blog more often than Taylor does?
Trying to wrap my head around the idea of Van Morrison blogging - -LOL !
He has never been much of a communicator except through his music - - Taylor is a virtual chatterbox by comparison - - and Van is known for being downright - umm - "uncooperative" with the media folk who have the guts to tackle an interview. VM's site is here:
http://www.vanmorrison.co.uk/
Liz - this is a great site - I hadn't stumbled over it before - - thank you ! !
This blogger has created a great site to support Van Morrison. His regular readership is undoubtedly the type of music followers Taylor will need to impress going forward in the music path he seems to be choosing (please ! ! )
Taylor's quote being included in that collection may be just a function of Google - but just the fact that it is there and will be seen by fans of VM is laying down some nicely postive ground work. Have spent some time scrolling through and Taylor should be so lucky as to have someone doing a site like this one for him. Oh wait - - - nevermind . . . .
Am excited by the Jan 14th entry about VM having a new album dropping 3/11 and even more by this statement - -
KEEP IT SIMPLE is Morrison's first album of new material since 2005, and the first in several years in which he penned all 11 songs specifically for one album.
Would recommend the Jan 21st 40th Anniversary Appreciation of Astral Weeks piece as an interesting discussion with ideas that apply to more than Van and his music. Couple of excerpts - -
"I believe the world in general does not welcome great art, because great art tends to be disturbing in some fundamental way. So for the artist, the struggle is monumental both in terms of creating the art in itself, and creating it in the knowledge that the world will try to put him down at every turn."
If anything, there is even less chance in 2008 than in 1968 that the true nature of Morrison's achievement might be appreciated. It's not that the junk is getting worse, it's just that there's so much more of it.
We are inundated. We hardly even bother discriminating any more between good and bad, let alone between the good and the great. Let alone between the great and the greatest of the great.
If anything, there is even less chance in 2008 than in 1968 that the true nature of Morrison's achievement might be appreciated. It's not that the junk is getting worse, it's just that there's so much more of it.
We are inundated. We hardly even bother discriminating any more between good and bad, let alone between the good and the great. Let alone between the great and the greatest of the great.
So true -- I often feel so fortunate to have grown up in the late 60s, early 70s, when there were new sounds at every turn. There was an awareness and expectation that popular music would continue to innovate, get more interesting and complex -- books were published about the Poetry of Rock lyrics. Now it's all Units.
Tay's comment is about halfway through