Van Morrison Quotes
- All Quotes
-
[Jean-Paul] Sartre was a throwback to the existential period. I'm not really so much into that these days. I went through a period of going over things and looking at them again to see what they were. But I'm into psychiatry type things. I'm into philosophy. I'm into that sort of thing.
-
I have to accept the fact that I was putting out records that reviewers were going to get an image from.
-
Sometimes, when the spirit moves me I can do many wondrous things I wanna know when the spirit moves you Did ye get healed?
-
What I like is natural music. It's like I was born with a gift to do something naturally, which I have no choice but to followup on.
-
Ambition will take you And ride you too far and Conservatism bring you to boredom once more Sit down by the river And watch the stream flow Recall all the dreams That you once used to know The things you've forgotten That took you away To pastures not greener but meaner.
-
When I started out in this business, I was a performer before I was a songwriter, I was a performer before I was recording. Performing is the roots. That's where it all came from. You didn't start out doing it because you wanted to make an album.
-
[Being alcoholic] you're either too high or you're too low. I mean, I was always looking for the bell to ring. I was always waiting for that bell.
-
The thing about albums is just coming up with new material. I just got tired of that syndrome of putting out an album and then some reviewer claims that this song or that song has something to do with x y or z.
-
It's the emotion...each word has got a connotation and symbolism and the thing is finding what's behind the word-what meaning it has and what emotion. I'm really into vocal repetition as a definite art form.
-
I thought of collaborating with other people which still might happen at this point. It might not. I was just trying to break the cycle because I had gotten to a point where I was definitely sure that I was on the wrong track after about 16 years.
-
There's always stress involved in any genre or art form, there's always going to be a struggle. If there's no struggle, you wouldn't do anything. What are you going do? Retire?
-
I just wanted to stop and try to get some perspective. [ A Period of Transition] it was just a matter of wanting to review the whole thing...to try and get some relationship to what I was doing.
-
I'm a dweller of the threshold and I'm waiting at the door, and I'm standing in the darkness, I don't want to wait no more.
-
I don't have any regrets about the album [Veedon Fleece]. But it's the same old story - an album is basically 35 or 40 minutes of what you do. It's 'part' of what you do.
-
I just wanted to have a look at my whole musical career, get right back to when I started and why I started doing it in the first place.
-
Skiffle was blues featuring a washboard and acoustic instruments. It encompassed blues, with elements of folk, jazz, and, at times, American country-and-western music.
-
There's an angel that's watching right over you All your trials have not been in vain Won't you lift your head up to the starry night Finding strength in the things that remain.
-
It was like I had evolved to a certain stage where I was stuck in this songwriter bag as an image. But basically at heart, I'm a rocker. And I still am. But I was caught up in the singer/songwriter bag and I wasn't really enjoying it.
-
Jazz comes from a tradition where it swings. Swing was the main ingredient of jazz. And once it loses the swing...well, that's it.
-
You know what they're writing about Baby you know what they're writing about It's a thing called love down through the ages Makes you wanna cry sometimes Makes you feel like you wanna lay down and die sometimes Makes you high sometimes But when you really get in it lifts you right up.
-
Somebody's going to hear a song that will key in a nerve or something in their experience that represents their own vision. And the next person is going to see it completely different. So even what it means to me is probably irrelevant. It's totally irrelevant. What matters is what it means to each person listening to it.
-
I realized that what I was looking for was doing collaborations with other people - people who can play a ballad, rock, jazz. I was looking for more co-op type things than what I had been doing, which had been completely my own trip.
-
I'm talking about noise rock. I don't think that noise rock element belongs in jazz. It's not for me anyway; it just doesn't fit.
-
When you perform live, it's a different trip - it's different energy. I just felt a conflict between both of the trips. I was trying to evaluate what it meant for me to be a singer/songwriter and what that whole thing all meant.