Listen to the Lion
Encyclopedia
"Listen to the Lion" is a song featured on Northern Irish
singer-songwriter
Van Morrison
's sixth album, Saint Dominic's Preview
(1972). Its poetic musings and "bass-led shuffle" lead back to Astral Weeks
territory.
in 1969 but not used. The longer eleven minute version that is featured on the Saint Dominic's Preview album was recorded during the 1971 sessions at the Columbia Studios in San Francisco and intended for the album Tupelo Honey
.
Morrison plays guitar along with Ronnie Montrose
. Connie Kay
(drums on Astral Weeks) and Gary Mallaber
(percussion and vibraphone
on Moondance
) are also featured players on this song. Morrison, Montrose and Boots Houston perform the back-up vocals. According to Ritchie Yorke
, "Van used his voice so superbly in this track that it seemed to become part of the instrumentation... Van's schooling in the art of R&B repetition was never adapted so perfectly."
)
"Listen to the Lion" was one of the 1001 Songs
written about in the 2006 book by critic Toby Creswell
who says in part: "Listen to the Lion has almost no words, just the phrase 'Listen to the Lion inside of me'...He sings the phrases like an incantation, sometimes desperate and longing for love and at other times boasting of the power of his passion; and then at other times he sings in despair that these emotions have brought him nothing but ruin. He doesn't need to speak, there's nothing more to be said..."
A sequel to this 1972 song was included on Morrison's 2005 album, Magic Time that was entitled, "The Lion This Time".
During the November 2008 concert performances at the Hollywood Bowl
in Los Angeles, California
, Morrison used this song as an encore after the live Astral Weeks
song performances. It has been listed under a new extended title of "Listen to the Lion - The Lion Speaks" on the track listing of the live album Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl
. In a January 2009 interview, Morrison said: "I wanted to end the Astral Weeks set with 'Madame George'. I wanted to tell people at the end these songs are a 'train of thought' and leave it at that. I think 'Lion' is a song that is all me, as well, so I ended with that...It's a song I guess about me—probably the only one about me." Also showing the magnitude of this work to the composer is the announcement that Morrison's new record label will be entitled Listen to the Lion Records.
Jay Cocks
commented on the song: "You can hear Morrison courting this muse in the Pentecostal growls and incantations of Listen to the Lion on his 1972 album Saint Dominic's Preview..."
Robert Christgau
's review of Saint Dominic's Preview uses this song to point out that vocals are sometimes more important than words: "Listen to the lion," he [Morrison] advises later, referring to that lovely frightening beast inside each of us, and midway through the eleven-minute cut he lets the lion out, moaning and roaring and growling and stuttering in a scat extension that would do Leon Thomas proud."
highlight for several years during the 1970s. This song along with "Saint Dominic's Preview
", "I Will Be There
" and "Jackie Wilson Said (I'm in Heaven When You Smile)
" were the only songs from the 1972 album that he performed live.
. After barking out demands for "water" like a dying man, his rendition of "Listen to the Lion" in this live performance ends in hushed quiet (like in a prayer) with an audibly awed audience
. A live performance of "Listen to the Lion" as performed by Morrison with most of the Common One band members is featured on the 2006 released DVD
, Live At Montreux 1980/1974
. "Listen to the Lion" from Saint Dominic's Preview was remastered in 2007 and included on the limited 3CD edition of the compilation album, Still on Top - The Greatest Hits
. The song was also featured on Morrison's 2009 album Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl
, recorded forty years after the classic album Astral Weeks
was first released. "Listen to the Lion" is used as bonus material on the album along with "Common One
".
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
singer-songwriter
Singer-songwriter
Singer-songwriters are musicians who write, compose and sing their own musical material including lyrics and melodies. As opposed to contemporary popular music singers who write their own songs, the term singer-songwriter describes a distinct form of artistry, closely associated with the...
Van Morrison
Van Morrison
Van Morrison, OBE is a Northern Irish singer-songwriter and musician. His live performances at their best are regarded as transcendental and inspired; while some of his recordings, such as the studio albums Astral Weeks and Moondance, and the live album It's Too Late to Stop Now, are widely...
's sixth album, Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview is the sixth solo album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison. It was released in July 1972 by Warner Bros. Records...
(1972). Its poetic musings and "bass-led shuffle" lead back to Astral Weeks
Astral Weeks
Astral Weeks is the second solo album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison, released in November 1968 on Warner Bros. Records. It was Morrison's first album after Warner Bros. had been able to free him from his contract with Bang Records...
territory.
Recording and composition
"Listen to the Lion" was first recorded during the sessions for Morrison's third solo album MoondanceMoondance
Moondance is the third solo album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison. It was released on Warner Bros. Records on 28 February 1970 and peaked at #29 on Billboard's Pop Albums chart....
in 1969 but not used. The longer eleven minute version that is featured on the Saint Dominic's Preview album was recorded during the 1971 sessions at the Columbia Studios in San Francisco and intended for the album Tupelo Honey
Tupelo Honey
Tupelo Honey is the fifth solo album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison. It was released in October 1971 by Warner Bros. Records. Morrison had written all of the songs on the album in Woodstock, New York before his move to Marin County, California, except for "You're My Woman", which...
.
Morrison plays guitar along with Ronnie Montrose
Ronnie Montrose
Ronnie Montrose, is an Amercian rock guitarist who has headed his own bands as well as performing with a variety of musicians, including Sammy Hagar, Herbie Hancock, Van Morrison, The Beau Brummels, Boz Scaggs, Beaver & Krause, Gary Wright, Tony Williams, The Neville Brothers, Dan Hartman, Edgar...
. Connie Kay
Connie Kay
Connie Kay was an American jazz drummer.Kay was a member of the Modern Jazz Quartet from 1955 until the group's dissolution in 1974...
(drums on Astral Weeks) and Gary Mallaber
Gary Mallaber
Gary Mallaber is a Los Angeles session drummer, percussionist and singer. He got his start playing drums in a band from Buffalo, New York, known as Raven....
(percussion and vibraphone
Vibraphone
The vibraphone, sometimes called the vibraharp or simply the vibes, is a musical instrument in the struck idiophone subfamily of the percussion family....
on Moondance
Moondance
Moondance is the third solo album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison. It was released on Warner Bros. Records on 28 February 1970 and peaked at #29 on Billboard's Pop Albums chart....
) are also featured players on this song. Morrison, Montrose and Boots Houston perform the back-up vocals. According to Ritchie Yorke
Ritchie Yorke
Ritchie Yorke is an Australian-born author, broadcaster, historian and music journalist. Born in Brisbane in 1944, while his father was serving with the Australian Army, Yorke developed a passion for rock ‘n’ roll in his early teens.-Biography:...
, "Van used his voice so superbly in this track that it seemed to become part of the instrumentation... Van's schooling in the art of R&B repetition was never adapted so perfectly."
Significance
"Listen to the Lion" has been said to rank amongst Morrison's greatest work. "During the 11-minute voyage, he sings, shouts, improvises lines, delays and omits them, until he symbolically re-creates the sound of an unleashed lion within himself. It remains a considerable achievement." (Johnny RoganJohnny Rogan
Johnny Rogan is an author of Irish descent best known for his books about music and popular culture. He has written influential biographies of The Byrds, The Smiths and Van Morrison. His writing is characterised by "an almost neurotic attention to detail", epic length and a sometimes hostile...
)
"Listen to the Lion" was one of the 1001 Songs
1001 songs
1001 Songs: The Great Songs of All Time and the Artists, Stories and Secrets Behind Them is a compendium of notable popular recordings collected by Australian rock journalist and critic Toby Creswell...
written about in the 2006 book by critic Toby Creswell
Toby Creswell
Toby Creswell is an Australian music journalist and pop-culture writer. He was editor of Rolling Stone and a founding editor of Juice. In 1986 he co-wrote, with Martin Fabinyi, his first book Too Much Ain't Enough a biography of pub rocker and former Cold Chisel vocalist Jimmy Barnes...
who says in part: "Listen to the Lion has almost no words, just the phrase 'Listen to the Lion inside of me'...He sings the phrases like an incantation, sometimes desperate and longing for love and at other times boasting of the power of his passion; and then at other times he sings in despair that these emotions have brought him nothing but ruin. He doesn't need to speak, there's nothing more to be said..."
A sequel to this 1972 song was included on Morrison's 2005 album, Magic Time that was entitled, "The Lion This Time".
During the November 2008 concert performances at the Hollywood Bowl
Hollywood Bowl
The Hollywood Bowl is a modern amphitheater in the Hollywood area of Los Angeles, California, United States that is used primarily for music performances...
in Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, Morrison used this song as an encore after the live Astral Weeks
Astral Weeks
Astral Weeks is the second solo album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison, released in November 1968 on Warner Bros. Records. It was Morrison's first album after Warner Bros. had been able to free him from his contract with Bang Records...
song performances. It has been listed under a new extended title of "Listen to the Lion - The Lion Speaks" on the track listing of the live album Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl
Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl
Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl is the fifth live album recorded by Northern Irish singer/songwriter Van Morrison, and released in the US on February 24, 2009 and on February 9, 2009 in the UK...
. In a January 2009 interview, Morrison said: "I wanted to end the Astral Weeks set with 'Madame George'. I wanted to tell people at the end these songs are a 'train of thought' and leave it at that. I think 'Lion' is a song that is all me, as well, so I ended with that...It's a song I guess about me—probably the only one about me." Also showing the magnitude of this work to the composer is the announcement that Morrison's new record label will be entitled Listen to the Lion Records.
Reception
Andy Whitman, a Paste reviewer called this song, "the quintessential Van Morrison moment, the most thrilling and thrillingly strange soul music—in all senses of the term—ever recorded. It's the sound of a man casting off all earthly bounds and battering down the gates of heaven."Jay Cocks
Jay Cocks
Jay Cocks is a film critic and motion picture screenwriter.He is a graduate of Kenyon College. He was a critic for Time, Newsweek, and Rolling Stone, among other magazines, before moving into film writing....
commented on the song: "You can hear Morrison courting this muse in the Pentecostal growls and incantations of Listen to the Lion on his 1972 album Saint Dominic's Preview..."
Robert Christgau
Robert Christgau
Robert Christgau is an American essayist, music journalist, and self-proclaimed "Dean of American Rock Critics".One of the earliest professional rock critics, Christgau is known for his terse capsule reviews, published since 1969 in his Consumer Guide columns...
's review of Saint Dominic's Preview uses this song to point out that vocals are sometimes more important than words: "Listen to the lion," he [Morrison] advises later, referring to that lovely frightening beast inside each of us, and midway through the eleven-minute cut he lets the lion out, moaning and roaring and growling and stuttering in a scat extension that would do Leon Thomas proud."
Live performances
Morrison's performance of this song was considered a concertConcert
A concert is a live performance before an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, a choir, or a musical band...
highlight for several years during the 1970s. This song along with "Saint Dominic's Preview
Saint Dominic's Preview (song)
"Saint Dominic's Preview" is the title song on the 1972 sixth album of Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison. Gary Mallaber plays drums on this song and Morrison's then wife, Janet Planet, is one of the back-up vocalists....
", "I Will Be There
I Will Be There (Van Morrison song)
"I Will Be There" is a song featured on Northern Irish singer/songwriter Van Morrison's sixth album Saint Dominic's Preview . The song is also the B-side to Morrison's single "Warm Love", released in 1973....
" and "Jackie Wilson Said (I'm in Heaven When You Smile)
Jackie Wilson Said (I'm in Heaven When You Smile)
"Jackie Wilson Said " is a song written and performed by Van Morrison and featured as the opening track on his sixth studio album, Saint Dominic's Preview. It was released by Warner Bros...
" were the only songs from the 1972 album that he performed live.
Other releases
"Listen to the Lion" was one of the live performances recorded and included on Morrison's 1974 acclaimed live album, It's Too Late To Stop NowIt's Too Late to Stop Now
It's Too Late to Stop Now is a live album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison, released in 1974 . Frequently named as one of the best live albums ever recorded, It's Too Late to Stop Now was recorded during what has often been said to be Morrison's greatest phase as a live...
. After barking out demands for "water" like a dying man, his rendition of "Listen to the Lion" in this live performance ends in hushed quiet (like in a prayer) with an audibly awed audience
Audience
An audience is a group of people who participate in a show or encounter a work of art, literature , theatre, music or academics in any medium...
. A live performance of "Listen to the Lion" as performed by Morrison with most of the Common One band members is featured on the 2006 released DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
, Live At Montreux 1980/1974
Live at Montreux 1980/1974
Live at Montreux 1980/1974 is the first official DVD by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison. It was released on October 16, 2006. The films consist of two separate performances by Van Morrison at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland...
. "Listen to the Lion" from Saint Dominic's Preview was remastered in 2007 and included on the limited 3CD edition of the compilation album, Still on Top - The Greatest Hits
Still on Top - The Greatest Hits
Still on Top – The Greatest Hits is the third compilation album to be issued by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison in 2007 . It was released...
. The song was also featured on Morrison's 2009 album Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl
Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl
Astral Weeks Live at the Hollywood Bowl is the fifth live album recorded by Northern Irish singer/songwriter Van Morrison, and released in the US on February 24, 2009 and on February 9, 2009 in the UK...
, recorded forty years after the classic album Astral Weeks
Astral Weeks
Astral Weeks is the second solo album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison, released in November 1968 on Warner Bros. Records. It was Morrison's first album after Warner Bros. had been able to free him from his contract with Bang Records...
was first released. "Listen to the Lion" is used as bonus material on the album along with "Common One
Summertime in England
"Summertime in England" is the longest song on Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison's 1980 album, Common One and is approximately fifteen minutes long. Although the album this appeared on was not successful critically or commercially, this song would be performed by Morrison in concert...
".
Personnel
- Van MorrisonVan MorrisonVan Morrison, OBE is a Northern Irish singer-songwriter and musician. His live performances at their best are regarded as transcendental and inspired; while some of his recordings, such as the studio albums Astral Weeks and Moondance, and the live album It's Too Late to Stop Now, are widely...
- vocals, guitarGuitarThe guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
, backing vocalsBacking vocalistA backing vocalist or backing singer is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists... - Ronnie Montrose - guitar, backing vocals
- Mark Jordan - pianoPianoThe piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
- Bill ChurchBill ChurchWilliam 'Bill' Church , started out playing bass in a band called Sawbuck in 1969, with Mojo Collins, Starr Donaldson, Ronnie Montrose and Chuck Ruff. As the band was beginning to record their first album, Montrose and Church left Sawbuck to join Van Morrison on his Tupelo Honey album...
- bassBass guitarThe bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick.... - Connie KayConnie KayConnie Kay was an American jazz drummer.Kay was a member of the Modern Jazz Quartet from 1955 until the group's dissolution in 1974...
- drumsDrum kitA drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person .... - Gary MallaberGary MallaberGary Mallaber is a Los Angeles session drummer, percussionist and singer. He got his start playing drums in a band from Buffalo, New York, known as Raven....
- percussion, vibraphoneVibraphoneThe vibraphone, sometimes called the vibraharp or simply the vibes, is a musical instrument in the struck idiophone subfamily of the percussion family.... - "Boots" Rolf Houston - backing vocals
External links
- Rolling Stone Review-album/songs Listen to the Lion