Country Singers

"Enlightenment says the world is nothing Nothing but a dream, everything's an illusion And nothing is real."

"The warm look of radiance on your face And your heart beating close to mine And the evening fading in the candle glow This must be what it's all about Oh this must be what it's all about This must be what paradise is like So quiet in here. So peaceful in here So quiet in here, yeah, so peaceful in here."

"The way you see me walking on That's why I'm telling you in song There's only one way to get ahead You've got to give it up instead Start all over again."

"Say que sera, whatever will be But then I keep on searching for immortality She's so beautiful but she's going to die some day Everything in life just passes away But, precious time is slipping away You know she's only queen for a day It doesn't matter to which God you pray"

"And it's a hard road, it's a hard road daddy-o When my job is turning lead into gold He was born in the back street, born in the back street jelly roll I'm on the road again and I'm searching for The philosophers stone Can you hear that engine Can you hear that engine drone Well I'm on the road again and I'm searching for..."

"I saw you standing with the wind and the rain in your face And you were thinking 'bout the wisdom of the leaves and their grace When the leaves come falling down In September when the leaves, come falling down Oh, the last time I saw Paris in the streets, in the rain And as I walk along the boulevards with you, once again And the leaves come falling down In September, when the leaves come falling down"

"Van Morrison is interested, obsessed with how much musical or verbal information he can compress into a small space, and, almost, conversely, how far he can spread one note, word, sound, or picture."

"They asked me to come to New York to help celebrate Van's induction into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame. I went because I see Van as one of the cats that has kept the faith. Like me, he's always himself — he stays true to the music that means the most to him. It meant a lot to sing "Crazy Love" on stage that evening."

"He extends himself only to express himself. Alone among rock's great figures — and even in that company he is one of the greatest — Morrison is adamantly inward. And unique. Although he freely crosses musical boundaries —R. and B., Celtic melodies, jazz, rave-up rock, hymns, down-and-dirty blues — he can unfailingly be found in the same strange place: on his own wavelength."

"I love Van Morrison because he always seems to be searching, never found. I don't know about his personal life but in his music he gives the listener only a question. The answer lies elsewhere to be attained someday."

"Van Morrison remains a singer who can be compared to no other in the history of modern popular music."

"Van Morrison should be friggin' canonized."

"My first impression of Van Morrison was that he was a terrific singer. No, I take that back. I thought he was a really dirty singer. Everything he did had a real big pair of balls to it."

"A great Irish poet"

"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."

"There was a definite charisma when Van performed. Van always had something about him. Whether you liked it or not, you could never take away from the fact that he was different from all other human beings, and here he is today, still being different."

"Morrison remains a singer who can be compared to no other performer in the history of rock 'n' roll, a singer who can not be pinned down, dismissed or fitted into anyone's expectations. He is a conundrum."

"These are the days now that we must savour And we must enjoy as we can These are the days that will last forever You've got to hold them, hold them in your heart"

"Where I feel this has cost me is in the personality situation, where you're expected to be a personality. You not only have to write and record, but you have to go out and sell it. Well, I'm not a salesman, and I'm very bad at selling things. If I had to do that for a living, I'd probably be completely broke. I can't sell myself. And I don't even want to. That's something that's not going to change."

"Someone once described me as a maverick and that's what I would say. I'm a maverick not by choice but by conviction."

"Like I say, the way I write songs is, you know, inspirational. I have to wait for it to happen. And when it happens I get lines, and I just write them down, you know. I'm not sort of a Tin Pan Alley sort of songwriter. I just sort of write down what I get - without censoring or questioning what it is and what it means, you know. Like later on I look at what it means, but not at the time."

"Music is spiritual. The music business is not."

"With Moondance, I wrote the melody first. I played the melody on a soprano sax and I knew I had a song so I wrote lyrics to go with the melody. That's the way I wrote that one. I don't really have any words to particularly describe the song, sophisticated is probably the word I'm looking for. For me, Moondance is a sophisticated song. Frank Sinatra wouldn't be out of place singing that."

"Into the Music was about the first album where I felt, 'I'm starting here'...the Wavelength thing, I didn't really feel that was me."

"The odd time something happens and you go into some kind of enchantment (on stage). But you have to work very hard to get that. Most of the time you're just playing and singing the songs, and there's no guarantee that you are going to get anywhere...."

"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"

"When I was fifteen, I became a professional musician. I got involved with people and did certain things which led me to start making records and touring. And leaving Belfast and going to London and America, one thing led to another and I got caught up in the life that I'm living now...I was very young and i followed something. (1993)"

"There is one thing I don't understand about Astral Weeks. Of all the records I have ever made that one is definitely not rock. You could throw that record at the wall, take it to music colleges, analyze it to death. Nobody is going to tell me that it is a rock album. Why they keep calling it one I have no idea."

"People think I'm eccentric, cranky. If I'm eccentric because I've never been into mainstream things, then I am eccentric."

"I've never been comfortable working live, and I'm still not. I was always more music-oriented and less star-oriented, which is why I've never been comfortable on big stages in big halls."

"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."

"I don't think I will ever mellow out. I think if you mellow out, you get eaten up. You become like a commodity. So I don't think I will mellow out. It is not in my blood."

"Hey where did we go, Days when the rains came Down in the hollow, Playin' a new game, Laughing and a running hey, hey Skipping and a jumping In the misty morning fog with Our hearts a thumpin' and you My brown eyed girl, You my brown eyed girl."

"So hard to find my way, Now that I'm all on my own. I saw you just the other day, My how you have grown, Cast my memory back there, Lord Sometimes I'm overcome thinking 'bout Making love in the green grass Behind the stadium with you My brown eyed girl You my brown eyed girl."

"If I ventured in the slipstream, Between the viaducts of your dream, Where immobile steel rims crack, And the ditch in the back roads stop, Could you find me? Would you kiss my eyes? To lay me down, In silence easy, To be born again. To be born again."

"Got a home on high Ain't nothing but a stranger in this world I'm nothing but a stranger in this world I got a home on high In another land So far away."

"Way over on the railroad, Tomorrow all the tipping trucks will unload together, Every scrapbook stuck with glue, And I'll stand beside you, Beside you, child."

"The dynamo of your smile caressed a barefoot virgin child to wander."

"And I shall drive my chariot Down your streets and cry 'Hey, it's me, I'm dynamite And I don't know why' We shall walk and talk In gardens all misty wet with rain And I will never, never, never Grow so old again"

"Yonder comes my lady Rainbow ribbons in her hair Yonder comes my lady Rainbow ribbons in her hair Six white horses and a carriage She's returning from the fair"

"And you know you gotta go On that train from Dublin up to Sandy Row Throwing pennies at the bridges down below And the rain, hail, sleet, and snow Say goodbye to Madame George Dry your eye for Madame George Wonder why for Madame George"

"And this time I forget to slip into your slumber The light is on the left side of your head And I'm standing in your doorway And I'm mumbling and I can't remember the last thing that ran through my head"

"Saw you early this morning With your brand new boy and your Cadillac Saw you early this morning With your brand new boy and your Cadillac You're gone for something And I know you won't be back"

"Well it's a marvelous night for a moondance, With the stars up above in your eyes. A fantabulous night to make romance, 'Neath the cover of October skies. And all the leaves on the trees are falling To the sound of the breezes that blow. And I'm trying to please to the calling Of your heart-strings that play soft and low. And all the night's magic seems to whisper and hush, And all the soft moonlight seems to shine in your blush.Can I just have one more moondance with you, my love? Can I just make some more romance with you, my love?"

"I can hear her heart beat from a thousand miles And the heavens open every time she smiles And when I come to her that's where I belong Yet I'm running to her like a river's song."

"Turn up your radio and let me hear the song Switch on your electric light Then we can get down to what is really wrong I long to hold you tight so I can feel you Sweet lady of the night I shall reveal you."

"And it stoned me to my soul Stoned me just like Jelly Roll And it stoned me And it stoned me to my soul Stoned me just like goin' home. And it stoned me."

"Hark, now hear the sailors cry, Smell the sea and feel the sky. Let your soul and spirit fly into the mystic."

"And when that foghorn blows, I will be coming home, When that foghorn blows, I wanna hear it, I don't have to fear it, And I wanna rock your gypsy soul, Just like way back in the days of old, And magnificently we will fold Into the mystic."

"My back was up against the wall And you slowly just walked away You never really heard my call When I cried out that way With my face against the sun You pointed out for me to go Then you said I was the one Had to reap what you did sow."