- Mystic Eyes
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For the Jamaican group, see Anthony Johnson (musician).
"Mystic Eyes" 
Single by Them from the album The Angry Young Them B-side "If You And I Could Be As Two" (Morrison) Released November 12, 1965 Length 2:43 Label Decca Records (UK)
Parrot Records (US)Writer(s) Van Morrison Them singles chronology "Here Comes the Night"
(1964)"Mystic Eyes"
(1965)"Call My Name"
(1966)"Mystic Eyes" is a song written by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison when he was leader of the band Them. It was the opening tune for the band's first album, The Angry Young Them that was released in June 1965. It was released as a single in the US and UK on November 12, 1965 and charted at No. 33 in the US.
Contents
Recording history
In 1965, Van Morrison explained to a Belfast reporter how the song had just happened during the first recording session for the album and the band was just "busking" around. "Someone started playing a fast riff and we all just joined in. The lyrics I sing at the end were just words from a song I had been writing at the time." Later in 1966 he told an American reporter how it was inspired by an occasion in Nottingham Park as he walked by a graveyard wall where some children played next to it. "You know, man, there was life and death beside one another so close...yet so different...And then I thought of the bright lights in the children's eyes...and the cloudy lights in the eyes of the dead."[1]
Tommy Scott who was acting producer of Them sessions after Bert Berns returned to America described how "Mystic Eyes" came about in the studio as being originally conceived as an instrumental: "after blowing his harmonica for about seven minutes, Van suddenly burst into this spontaneous lyric." The ten minute take was condensed to a single's length by cutting from the beginning and ending of the instrumental. It was recorded at the Regent Sound a mono studio in Denmark Street in London England.[2]
Aftermath
"Mystic Eyes" was not released as a single until five months after the album that it was the opening song on. ln the United States, it was promoted as the follow-up to "Gloria" and was a successful single. In the UK, it did not chart.
Greil Marcus said about hearing "Mystic Eyes" for the first time: "I'd never heard anything like that. A piece of music that was supposedly made for airplay, with this long instrumental introduction that was really the whole song."[3] Marcus also wrote in a 1969 Rolling Stone article on Van Morrison: '"Mystic Eyes" though, was a triumph for both Van as an artist responsible to no one but himself, and for the band. Van wrote it after watching children frolicking among the tombstones of an ancient cemetery, and the vocal consisted in essence of Van chanting virtually demonic incantations over a mad tempo and the harsh chords of a biting guitar."[4]
Other releases
This was one of the songs included on the compilation album, The Story of Them Featuring Van Morrison released in 1997 on the Deram Records label.
In the media
This song was featured in the HBO series The Sopranos, and appears on the 2000 release of the Soundtrack to the Sopranos.[5]
Cover versions
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers frequently cover "Mystic Eyes" in concert. A 2006 performance was included on the 4-disc version of the documentary on Tom Petty, entitled Runnin' Down a Dream.[6] A different 2006 version is also included on their 4-CD collection, The Live Anthology.[7]
Notes
- ^ Heylin, Can You Feel the Silence?, p. 106-107
- ^ Heylin, Can You Feel the Silence?, p. 107
- ^ Heylin, Can You Feel The Silence?", p. 106
- ^ Rolling Stone Magazine: Greil Marcus review:Astral Weeks 1969-03-01
- ^ "Reviews of soundtrack to The Sopranos". psnw.com. http://www.psnw.com/~randyk/032400.htm. Retrieved 2009-11-10.
- ^ "Mudcrutch Farm - Runnin' Down a Dream". mudcrutch.com. http://www.mudcrutch.com/index.php?pageid=runnin_down_a_dream. Retrieved 2009-11-10.
- ^ Collette, Doug (2010-02-20). "Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers: The Live Anthology". allaboutjazz. http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=35556. Retrieved 2010-05-26.
References
- Heylin, Clinton (2003). Can You Feel the Silence? Van Morrison: A New Biography, Chicago Review Press ISBN 1-55652-542-7
Them Van Morrison · Billy Harrison · Eric Wrixon · Alan Henderson · Raymond Sweetman
Ronnie Millings · Pat McAuley · Jackie McAuley · Peter BardensRegular UK albums The Angry Young Them (1964) • Them Again (1965)Singles
(Decca, Parrott)"Don't Start Crying Now" (1964) • "Baby, Please Don't Go" / "Gloria" (1964) • "Here Comes the Night" (1965) • "One More Time" (1965) • "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" • "Call My Name" • "I Can Only Give You Everything" • "Richard Cory" (1966)Categories:- 1965 singles
- Them (band) songs
- Van Morrison songs
- Songs written by Van Morrison
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