Van Morrison – Remembering Now (Vinyl)

Released on Exile/Virgin, Remembering Now is Van Morrison's first collection of original songs since 2022, and the strongest case in decades that the Belfast man's muse never really left. Opening with 'Down to Joy', the Oscar-nominated song from Kenneth Branagh's Belfast, the fourteen tracks find him back among the Hammond grooves, horns and soaring strings of his classic period, with arrangements by longtime collaborator Fiachra Trench and fiddle from Seth Lakeman.

The mood is reflective without being nostalgic. 'Haven't Lost My Sense of Wonder' says it plainly, 'Stomping Ground' revisits the Strandtown streets of his youth, and the eight-minute closer 'Stretching Out' reaches for the rhapsodic, long-form territory of Common One. Critics have called it his best record since Hymns to the Silence, and it is hard to argue: this is Morrison reconnecting with the Celtic soul, R&B and spiritual searching that made him, sounding fully at ease in his 80th year.