Legacy Recordings Acquires Catalog of Music Legend Van Morrison

Thankfully they did

 

Hahaha!

(Hahaha)

That was very funny!

(That was very fuuuunny!)

 

Well played!

 

"There has been a fair bit of Van Morrison activity in the past week, with the news that Sony’s Legacy Recordings has acquired the rights to much of the man’s back catalogue and also that 1968’s Astral Weeks and 1970’s His Band and the Street Choir (both still owned by Warners and not part of the Sony deal) will be reissued and expanded by Rhino in October.

Rhino put out a reissue of Moondance back in 2013 in quite some style, with a top-of-the-range 4CD+blu-ray set and a two-CD deluxe. The new expanded editions of the albums that originally sandwiched 1969’s Moondance are more modest affairs since they will be single disc reissues. You will still get remastered audio of course and each album will also feature previously unreleased versions of several album tracks.

In terms of the other news, Sony will now get to work planning their own Van Morrison reissue campaign having acquired “more than 50 years of music”. They now have the rights to the early Them albums (and compilations) and more or less all the solo work from 1972’s Saint Dominic’s Preview onwards.

In fact, Sony have specifically said that deluxe Legacy Editions of Saint Dominic’s Preview, It’s Too Late to Stop Now, Hard Nose the Highway and Enlightenment are part of their plans, as well as a new career-spanning single CD compilation. But for now they are kicking things off with a double-disc set The Essential Van Morrison.

The Essential Van Morrison is out now, while Astral Weeks and His Band and the Street Choir will be reissued on 30 October 2015."

Albums newly acquired by Legacy Recordings:
Them

• The Angry Young Them / Them (1965)
• Them Again (1966)
• Them featuring Van Morrison (compilation, 1972)
• The Story of Them featuring Van Morrison (compilation, 1997)

Van Morrison

• St. Dominic’s Preview (1972)
• Hard Nose the Highway (1973)
• It’s Too Late to Stop Now (Live) (1974)
• Veedon Fleece (1974)
• A Period of Transition (1977)
• Wavelength (1978)
• Into the Music (1979)
• Common One (1980)
• Beautiful Vision (1982)
• Inarticulate Speech of the Heart (1983)
• Live at the Grand Opera House, Belfast (Live) (1984)
• A Sense of Wonder (1984)
• No Guru, No Method, No Teacher (1984)
• Poetic Champions Compose (1987)
• Irish Heartbeat (w/the Chieftains) (1988)
• Avalon Sunset (1989)
• Enlightenment (1990)
• Hymns to the Silence (1991)
• Too Long in Exile (1993)
• A Night in San Francisco (Live) (1994)
• Days Like This (1995)
• How Long Has This Been Going On? (1995)
• Tell Me Something: The Songs of Mose Allison (1996)
• The Healing Game (1997)
• The Philosopher’s Stone (2CD outtakes compilation, 1998)
• Back on Top (1999)
• The Skiffle Sessions: Live in Belfast (Live) (2000)
• Down the Road (2002)
• What’s Wrong with This Picture? (2003)
• Magic Time (2005)
• Pay the Devil (2006)
• Keep it Simple (2008)
• Astral Weeks “Live at the Hollywood Bowl” (Live) (2009)

source: http://www.superdeluxeedition.com/news/van-morrison-astral-weeks-expanded-and-other-news/

 

this is amazing news!!! cannot wait!!

 

47 new Vzn Morrison threads later.

 

God forbid if a Van thread knocks a what if the Beatles did not do drugs discussion off page one.

 

Wish people would use the search function in a capable manner before posting a thread that has already been going for almost a week. Really annoying. Plus this exact subject is being discussed in at least 3 other Van threads!
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...-catalog-of-music-legend-van-morrison.458339/

 

This is definitely a redundant thread but it would be better IMO to be a bit more kind and courteous in pointing this out. The limitations of the forum's search function, which can be very dodgy in terms of chronological results and are also at the mercy of thread titles that can be pretty vague and nebulous, could frustrate even the best intentions. (I just did a search for threads with "van morrison" in the title, and if I hadn't been very familiar with the recent Sony Legacy discussions I might have easily missed them.)

 

Regarding searching this forum - you may not be aware that you can use Google to search an individual site by typing the following into the Goggle search box:

site:stevehoffman.tv xyz

Simply replace xyz with what you are searching for:

site:stevehoffman.tv van morrison

The above then gives the following results...(all 4,480 of them!)

 

Has most of the THEM songs ever been available on CD in the US? Ever been in print on vinyl since the 1960's?

 

the dead give away is that he typed the second paragraph in a very high voice

 

A lot of their stuff was on the excellent (can't recommend it enough) comp The Story of Them. It usually goes for big bucks on ebay.

 

I havent seen the new Them reissues in the MFIT store yet, unlike the VM reissues.

 

It's a nice collection but the mastering is horrible.

 

Maybe we'll get a new collection with new remastering with the new announcement about Van's catalog.

 

I have that one and I agree it's an amazing comp! But I wonder: are all the songs released by Them included or is there anything missing (apart from the Mighty Like a Rose demo)?

 

Not sure, but hopefully we'll get some deluxe editions of the Them material.

 

Have we decided which masterings are used on 'The Essential Van Morrisson'? I thought 'into the mystic' sounded like the old WB CD version, then that pesky TAMBOURINE appeared and shattered my illusions. Great compilation, really enjoying the 'kinder-gentler,album releasing' side of Van.

 

I saw that How Long Has This Been Going On is released in high resolution (24/96) on Qobuz. Does this mean that the whole catalog will be released in this quality by Legacy?

http://www.qobuz.com/nl-nl/album/ho...rison-with-georgie-fame-friends/0886445393699

(I apologize if this question has answered before, couldn't find it with search or in the press release )

 

This whole thing is still a bit puzzling to me. I don't want to stream or buy from iTunes but would prefer lossless or hi-Rez recordings. Are they going to release this stuff for download in either of these formats?

Another question is on the timing of the Legacy releases and whether these will become available in hi-Rez. For selfish reasons, I certainly hope St. Dominic's Preview is the first release. It will be exciting to see what kind of Outtakes they come up with.

Since this news came out, I have been digging back into the Moondance expanded edition release. The stripped down versions of Into the Mystic and Brand New Day are just stunning. I may prefer them to the released versions. Hopefully there will also be revelations like this from St. Dominic's.

 

I have read in this thread there are lossless versions via Pono, no? Also one or two releases in hi rez there and at HD Tracks.

My iTunes purchase of Beautiful Vision has been the most aurally therapeutic seven bucks I can remember spending. I haven't listened to the APOT remaster yet as a result of listening multiple times to that BV. I love the sound of that album. The electric guitars have like this jangly and perhaps chiming effect on me that is soothing but still rolling like steady ocean waves and the horns seem to float on air and weave in suspended streams like an Avalaon Sunset or a Brand New Day. And the tick tock hi hat like a gentle reminder, the wisp of and whoosh of a second hand always propelling forward yet always arriving home again.

LOL. Sorry anyone had to read that It sure felt right and almost made sense at the time heh heh heh.

A lovely album. Can't say enough nice things about it right now.

Listening to the remastered Moondance cd. I like the surround downmkx to stereo best for fidelity and will listen to that this weekend. Agree I actually prefer sone of the instrumentation, mix, and sound quality of some of the other recordings from the three discs of bonus tracks.

 

"It's Too Late To Stop Now" is on 7digital.com, 24bit 96kHz for £12.99. I'm downloading it now....

 

Highlights of Van 's 70th birthday concert at Cypress Avenue are on BBC4 tomorrow (Sunday) night.