Saturday, May 24, 2008

Little Black Book: Gloria



Them: Gloria

[purchase]

Gloria isn't a song, but a shamanistic incantation from Rock's High Priest, Van Morrison. During the earliest live performances, eighteen year old Morrison would often improvise lyrics, sometimes stretching it out to fifteen or twenty minutes long.

I watch her come up to my house
She knocks upon my door
And then she comes up to my room
I want to say she makes me feel all right
G L O R I A
Gloria is one of those epochal numbers whose DNA runs deep in Rock and Roll's genome. Dave Barry joked "If you drop a guitar down a flight of stairs, it'll play 'Gloria' on its way to the bottom." Paul Williams wrote, "Into the heart of the beast... here is something so good, so pure, that if no other hint of it but this record existed, there would still be such a thing as rock and roll.... Van Morrison's voice a fierce beacon in the darkness, the lighthouse at the end of the world. Resulting in one of the most perfect rock anthems known to humankind." I couldn't have said it any better myself - bask in the glory that is Gloria.

6 comments:

WEB SHERIFF said...

WEB SHERIFF
Protecting Your Rights on the Internet
Tel 44-(0)208-323 8013
Fax 44-(0)208-323 8080
websheriff@websheriff.com
www.websheriff.com

Hi SMM,

On behalf of Exile Productions and Exile Publishing, many thanks for plugging Van Morrison and, if you / your readers want good quality, non-pirated, preview tracks from Van’s new album – “Keep It Simple” - full versions of "That's Entrainment" and "Behind The Ritual" (along with album track samplers) are available for fans and bloggers to link on Lost Highway's web-site at http://www.losthighwayrecords.com .

Up-to-the-minute info on Keep It Simple and Van’s 2008 shows is, of course, also available on www.vanmorrison.com and www.myspace.com/vanmorrison and, for a limited period, you can still hear Van's exclusive BBC concert at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/radio2_aod.shtml?radio2/r2_vanmorrison and you can also see his BBC sessions at http://www.bbc.co.uk/musictv/vanmorrison/video/ .

Thanks again for your support.

Regards,

WEB SHERIFF

boyhowdy said...

For those new to websherrif: Websherrif does two things: it puts take-down notices in comments, and it uses posts like this to promote the labels that have contracted for its services. In both cases, it gets paid for doing so.

As far as I can tell, that makes the above post "commercial spam" by even the most generous definition.

I have nothing against people joining the crowd here, or using their own blogspaces to promote whatever the heck they want. But using OUR space to make money and promote labels, when we do NOT do such things, is not really okay with me.

As such: Unless someone else believes otherwise, can an admin please remove this comment?

WEB SHERIFF said...

WEB SHERIFF
Protecting Your Rights on the Internet
Tel 44-(0)208-323 8013
Fax 44-(0)208-323 8080
websheriff@websheriff.com
www.websheriff.com

Howdy BoyHowdy,

Thanks for your post, although you're perhaps being a little harsh on us, as we haven't posted a takedown request or Spam but, instead, have simply posted a "Thank You" on behalf of the artist concerned.

Anyway, we're happy to leave things up to the mods, but did nevertheless want you to appreciate that our posts are not 'robotic'. : )

All The Best,

WEB SHERIFF

boyhowdy said...

I appreciate the followup, WS folks.

Nevertheless, it takes only a sentence to say thank you. Including the promotional sentences that followed -- two paragraphs of them -- kind of overwhelmed the sentiment.

And there is no question, really, that you're getting paid for this. Your own website makes clear that you work for the label which you are promoting as a third-party company hired by them to protect their internet and media assets. I recognize that part of the service that you promote to your customers includes raising awareness of the legal spaces where their artists can be downloaded, as a counterpart to discouraging and countering illicit downloads.

Feel free to correct me if I have this wrong. The lines are fuzzy, so I don't blame you for erroneously thinking I called your message a take-down notice. And I absolutely appreciate your willingness to be up front about who you are and why you're here.

But I continue to maintain that comments are an inappropriate place for paid-service, third-party awareness-raising. Regardless of the product, or its relevance to the post topic.

Unknown said...

Huh. Interesting. I've never seem a WS posting before so, though it's a bit disoncerting to think that SMM might become an unwilling target for 3rd party advertisers down here in the comments section, at least I've been a little educated today.

Anonymous said...

An appearance by the Web Sheriff? This blog has made the big time!

PS: But I did not shoot no deputy, oh no.