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Van Morrison launches 'Simple' American jaunt
Van Morrison will be in North America next month for a handful of gigs to support his new studio effort, "Keep It Simple."
The week-long run is scheduled to kick off July 7 in Toronto and visit Detroit, Atlantic City and the Chicago and Philadelphia areas. The shows are sandwiched between Morrison's European dates, which include a July 19 headlining performance at the Stockholm Jazz Festival. North American performances are included below and those overseas can be found at Morrison's website.
The legendary Irish singer/songwriter scored the highest debut of his more than 40-year career with April's "Keep It Simple," which bowed at No. 10 on The Billboard 200. The album, Morrison's 35th, is his first collection of all-new material since 2005. He composed all 11 songs and wore the hats of composer, arranger, lyricist and producer.
The new record honors a wide variety of The Rock and Roll Hall of Famer's influences, including Celtic, jazz, folk, blues, country, soul and gospel. Several song samples from the set are streaming at his MySpace page.
Though he didn't put out an album of new music last year, Morrison was a fixture on The Billboard 200 with three separate hits collections: "Van Morrison at the Movies--Soundtrack Hits," "The Best of Van Morrison Volume 3" and "Still on Top--The Greatest."
The Grammy-winning performer also recently reissued a dozen albums from his back catalog. The remastered sets include previously unreleased bonus material, according to a press release.
