Tag: Tupelo Honey

Van Morrison – Tupelo Honey Album

I don’t do many album reviews because frankly…I think other people do them better but sometimes I cannot resist…and this is one of them.

When I was 18 or so, I ordered exports from Tower Records because you could not just go to many record stores in America and buy a Them album in the eighties.

I bought the “Backtracking” album which was a compilation of Them. His voice blew me away. That is when I looked in the Van Morrison section for the albums I could buy there. The first album I bought…just by chance…was Tupelo Honey.  Compared to the raw intense Them songs…this was a totally different ballgame. The songs’ production values and sophistication were in a new league.

Van Morrison - Tuepelo Honey 2

Personally, I really like this album. I thought it was a great introduction to his catalog.  Is it his best? No, it’s not, but for a beginner Van fan, it was a great introduction album. The songs on Tupelo Honey are very radio-friendly. After this album I bought Moondance, His Band and Street Choir, Veendon Fleece, etc…the 8 albums up to Wavelength. After that, I started on the 80’s catalog.

He made this album in 1971 when he moved to Northern California with his wife Janet Planet who was from that area. He originally wanted to make a country album. Soon that idea was dropped and he worked with Ted Templeton as producer. He used a lot of unused songs that he had.

The opening track Wild Night has an irresistible hook and is one of Van’s best-known songs. The title track may be my favorite Van Morrison song period. The only song that I would skip when I got the album, and still do, is I Wanna Roo You. In Moonshine Whiskey and some other songs, you can hear some of the country album he was going to make.

Another favorite on the album is Old Old Woodstock and he puts you there with his lyrics and the feel of the song. You’re My Woman was a song for Janet Planet and I’ve always liked that one.

The album peaked at #27 on the Billboard Album Charts and #32 in Canada in  1971.

Again, this is not Van’s best album but it got me into his solo career. It’s a great-sounding album and one of Van’s most commercial. I would highly recommend this to anyone wanting to explore Van the Man’s catalog.

Tracklist

Wild Night
(Straight to Your Heart) Like a Cannonball
Old Old Woodstock
Starting a New Life
You’re My Woman
Tupelo Honey
I Wanna Roo You (Scottish Derivative)
When That Evening Sun Goes Down
Moonshine Whiskey

I could not find the complete album on Spotify so I found it all grouped together on YouTube with this link…

Tupelo Honey

You can take all the tea in China
Put it in a big brown bag for me
Sail right around the seven oceans
Drop it straight into the deep blue sea
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
Just like honey from the bee

You can’t stop us on the road to freedom
You can’t keep us ’cause our eyes can see
Men with insight, men in granite
Knights in armor bent on chivalry
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
Just like honey from the bee

You can’t stop us on the road to freedom
You can’t stop us ’cause our eyes can see
Men with insight, men in granite
Knights in armor intent on chivalry
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
Just like honey from the bee

You know she’s alright
You know she’s alright with me
She’s alright, she’s alright (she’s an angel)

You can take all the tea in China
Put it in a big brown bag for me
Sail it right around the seven oceans
Drop it smack dab in the middle of the deep blue sea
Because she’s as sweet as tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
Just like honey from the bee

She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as tupelo honey
Just like the honey, baby, from the bee
She’s my baby, you know she’s alright…..

Van Morrison – Wild Night

I first heard this song in the eighties when I bought the Tupelo Honey album. Wild Night and the title track caught my attention immediately. This song is very radio-friendly and so is the album to a large extent. It was released in 1971 and peaked at #28 on the Billboard 100 and #20 in Canada.

John Mellencamp also released a version in 1994 and the song peaked at #3 in the Billboard 100. John did a great job but this is my go-to version. Van’s voice…you can’t beat it. If my fairy God Mother said to me…Max, you can have any voice you want…who will it be? It would be this man’s voice.

Ted Templeman, who would later produce another Van Halen, produced the Tupelo Honey album with Morrison. Musicians to perform on this track include Ronnie Montrose on electric guitar, John McFee on pedal steel guitar, Jack Schroer on saxophone, and Luis Gasca on trumpet.

I have always liked this album a lot. I have recommended some people to this album because it is very accessible compared to say…Astral Weeks. I love Astral Weeks by the way and I think it probably is his best album but it’s not as accessible when you first listen to it…not to me anyway. Van cleaned out a lot of leftover songs when he made this album but it is very enjoyable. The title track may be his finest song.

Van Morrison: “I wasn’t very happy with Tupelo Honey, it consisted of songs that were left over from before and that they’d finally gotten around to using. It wasn’t really fresh. It was a whole bunch of songs that had been hanging around for awhile. I was really trying to make a country and western album.”

 Wild Night
As you brush your shoes
Stand before the mirror
And you comb your hair
Grab your coat and hat
And you walk, wet streets
Tryin’ to remember
All the wild night breezes
In your mem’ry ever

And ev’rything looks so complete
When you’re walkin’ out on the street
And the wind catches your feet
Sends you flyin’, cryin’

Ooo-woo-wee!
Wild night is calling, alright
Oooo-ooo-wee!
Wild night is calling

And all the girls walk by
Dressed up for each other
And the boys do the boogie-woogie
On the corner of the street

And the people, passin’ by
Stare in wild wonder
And the inside juke-box
Roars out just like thunder

And ev’rything looks so complete
When you walk out on the street
And the wind catches your feet
And sends you flyin’, cryin’

Woo-woo-wee!
Wild night is calling
Alright

Ooo-ooo-wee!
Wild night is calling, alright

The wild night is calling
The wild night is calling

Come on out and dance
Whoa, come on out and make romance
Yes, indeed

Come on out and dance
Come on out, make romance

[Instrumental & horn solo]

The wild night is calling, alright
The wild night is calling

Come on out an dance
Yeah, come on out ‘n make romance

Come on out and dance, alright
Come on out, n’ make romance.

Van Morrison – Tupelo Honey

I’ve heard this song so much that I know every nuance of it. The song was on the album of the same name. This song would be in my top 5 of Van Morrison. It’s a beautiful epic song. I’ve always noticed the lyrics are not Morrison’s best by any means. The melody is not complicated, in fact, it is reminiscent of The Weight…same chord pattern. Van’s voice and phrasing lift this song into a great song. Well, there is Connie Kay’s drumming also.

The song peaked at #47 in the Billboard 100 in 1972. The album peaked at #27 in 1971.

From Songfacts

“Tupelo Honey” is an unreserved typically mystic take on the domestic happiness Morrison had found since he’d married his wife Janet. They’d met during his time with the Irish R&B band Them. She’d already been his muse for several of Morrison’s earlier songs.

Tupelo honey is honey made from the sweet flowers of the tupelo tree, which grows abundantly in swampy areas of the Southern United States. 

There are allusions to early America and the Boston Tea Party in this song:

You can take all the tea in China
Put it in a big brown bag for me
Sail right around the seven oceans
Drop it straight into the deep blue sea

And

You can’t stop us on the road to freedom
You can’t stop us ’cause our eyes can see

The Irish Troubles were still raging when this song was written, and it’s important to view it as the song of an artist who was a product of that situation. Freedom was surely heavy on Van’s mind.

This song plays at the conclusion of the 1997 film Ulee’s Gold, which stars Peter Fonda as a beekeeper who makes Tupelo Honey.

Tupelo Honey

You can take all the tea in China
Put it in a big brown bag for me
Sail right around all the seven oceans
Drop it straight into the deep blue sea
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
Just like honey from the bee

You can’t stop us on the road to freedom
You can’t keep us ’cause our eyes can see
Men with insight, men in granite
Knights in armor bent on chivalry
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
Just like honey, baby, from the bee

You can’t stop us on the road to freedom
You can’t stop us ’cause our eyes can see
Men with insight, men in granite
Knights in armor intent on chivalry
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
Just like honey, baby, from the bee

You know she’s alright, oh she’s alright with me
You know, you know, you know she’s alright, she alright with me
You know, you know, you know you know
You know she’s alright, alright with me
She’s alright, she’s alright
She’s alright with me
She’s alright 
She’s alright with me
She’s alright 
She’s alright with me

She’s al, she’s alright, she’s alright
She’s alright with me
She’s alright, she’s alright, she’s alright, she’s alright

You can take all the tea in China
Put it in a big brown bag for me
Sail it right around all these seven oceans
Drop it smack dab in the middle of the deep blue sea
Because, she’s as sweet as Tupelo honey, yes she is
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
Just like honey, baby, from the bee

She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
She’s an angel of the first degree
She’s as sweet as Tupelo honey
Just like the honey, from the bee
She’s alright, she’s alright with me
She’s my baby, you know she’s alright
She’s my baby, she’s my baby, she’s alright
She’s my baby

Van Morrison

Van the man is supposedly a difficult man to know but man can he sing and write… He started out with a group called Them in Belfast Ireland. They were very underrated and made some great music in the mid 60s. Gloria, Mystic Eyes, Baby Please Don’t Go, Here Comes The Night, Don’t Look Back and my favorite that is hard to find…”Mighty Like A Rose”…

He quit Them and signed with Bert Bern’s Bang records and wrote Brown Eyed Girl which sounds fresh no matter how many times i hear it. After the death of Berns he started on his great albums. Astral Weeks, Moondance, His Band and The Street Choir, Tupelo Honey, Saint Dominic’s Preview, Hard Nose the Highway and the list continues on.

My favorites are Moondance and Tupelo Honey. These albums are consistently great. I also love the title track to Saint Dominic’s Preview…it’s an epic song that I can listen to over and over with the imagery never getting old. I would suggest to anyone to get the early to mid seventies albums (but his other albums are great also) and listen to all the songs….not just the radio friendly ones. The radio songs are great… Moondance, Crazy Love, Tupelo Honey, Blue Money, Domino, Blue Money, Caravan, Wild Night but there is so much more.

Van’s voice and phrasing is like no other. I saw him live finally in 2006 and his voice was even better than I thought. If I could sing like anyone…I would pick Van.

For a person who wants to listen to Van for the first time… I would recommend the Tupelo Honey and Moondance albums to start off with…. Rock, country, folk, pop and some jazz for good measure…all mixed together in terrific songs… for his early work with Them get The Story of Them Featuring Van Morrison.