Astral Weeks: A Secret History of 1968

Music journalist Walsh’s uneven history uses the sessions that became Van Morrison’s enigmatic album Astral Weeks as an anchor for a wider history of the now-mostly-forgotten Boston music scene of 1968. That summer, Morrison left N.Y.C. to get away from the shady dealings of his producer, and to try to pursue his own musical path. He performed shows in Boston under the name the Van Morrison Conspiracy, and during his show at the Catacombs, he developed the songs that would eventually comprise Astral Weeks. Drawing on hundreds of interviews with musicians and on archival research, Walsh faithfully explores “the Bosstown Sound”—Boston’s own short-lived contribution to the psychedelic sounds of the late 1960s—and chronicles the lives of Boston bands such as Beacon Street Union, Orpheus, and Ultimate Spinach (in which future Steely Dan member Jeff “Skunk” Baxter played). The city’s jug-band scene, the harmonica player Mel Lyman (who started a commune whose members thought he was God), and the acid experiments at Harvard led by Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert all helped to create an atmosphere that influenced the music on Morrison’s album. Walsh can be an entertaining narrator, but he fails to weave his narrative threads into a seamless chronicle of rock-and-roll history. [em](Mar.) [/em]