Van Morrison Quotes
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In order to win you must be prepared to lose sometime. And leave one or two cards showing.
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As a developing musician, skiffle became a platform for me to start playing music.
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When all the dark clouds roll away And the sun begins to shine I see my freedom from across the way And it comes right in on time Well it shines so bright and it gives so much light And it comes from the sky above Makes me feel so free makes me feel like me And lights my life with love.
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Someone once described me as a maverick and that's what I would say. I'm a maverick not by choice but by conviction.
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What was happening with me, with the album [A Period of Transition], with the people who took the pictures, the record company, everything, getting a new manager [Harvey Goldsmith]-it was all saying a period of transition to me so that was the title choice. It says what it is and obviously nobody is going to analyze that. It's exactly what it is.
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All the girls walk by dressed up for each other, and the boys do the boogie woogie on the corner of the street.
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I do see value in music criticism. Most of the criticism I have received over the years has been very good.
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I just can't stand it [jazz/rock]. It just doesn't sound right to me. It doesn't hit me...it doesn't get me...it just doesn't grab me.
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I'd love to live in Ireland but I'd like to live as me, not what someone thinks I am. People don't understand - I lived there before I was famous.
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I think when you get past your second album, it all becomes something of a routine. So you have to struggle against that, find a way of making what you do sound fresh and new each time.
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The people I was listening to never sold a lot of records. John Lee Hooker was never on the charts, so I was never in it from a commercial point of view. Other people expected things from my records, but I never did.
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Did you ever hear about the rock and roll singer who got 3 or 4 Cadillacs, saying power to the people, dance to the music, wants you to pat him on the back.
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I haven't really heard much that's impressed me the way it was when I first heard Ray Charles or somebody like that. That was really an impression.
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Definitely Muddy Waters has been a prime influence for anybody who's ever done anything rock 'n' roll.
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There's always got to be a struggle. What else is there? That's what life is made of. I don't know anything else. If there is, tell me about it.
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There is no black-and-white situation. It's all part of life. Highs, lows, middles.
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Being famous was extremely disappointing for me. When I became famous it was a complete drag and it is still a complete drag.
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I'm not a rock singer and I don't want to be a rock singer. I'm not interested. It doesn't seem to get across.
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Even today, skiffle is a defining part of my music. If I get the opportunity to just have a jam, skiffle is what I love to play.
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It was really strange for me when I started to play concerts in America where the audiences were all sitting down.
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I've never felt like I was born with a silver spoon at all, although I've felt like howling at the moon a lot of times!
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When you start to analyze [rock 'n' roll], it's only because you don't understand it. You're just not connecting with it once you have to start analyzing it.
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Large audiences did not suit my low-key approach.
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When I started studying tenor saxophone as a kid in Belfast, I did so with a guy named George Cassidy, who was also a big inspiration.