Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-mkpzs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T05:24:47.816Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

‘My Tongue Gets t-t-t-’: Words, Sense, and Vocal Presence in Van Morrison's It's Too Late to Stop Now

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2016

RICHARD ELLIOTT
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Van Morrison's live version of his song ‘Cyprus Avenue’ on the 1974 album It's Too Late to Stop Now provides an example of the authority of the singer's voice and of how it leads and demands submission from musicians, songs, and audience. Morrison's voice constantly suggests that it is reflecting important experience and can be understood both as an attempt to capture something and as a post-hoc witnessing or testimony. Through the example of Morrison's work, and of It's Too Late to Stop Now in particular, this article explores the location of the voice in terms of the body and of particular places and histories. It then proceeds to a reflection on the relationship between the performing voice as producer of sound, noise, and music and the poetic voice that provides the words and visions upon which the performing voice goes to work. It concludes by focusing on a moment within ‘Cyprus Avenue’ where Morrison performs the act of being tongue-tied, discussing this as an example of ‘aesthetic stutter’. Throughout, attention is also paid to how other voices (particularly those of rock critics) connect to Morrison's voice by attempting to describe it, re-perform it, or explain it.

Type
Articles
Information
Twentieth-Century Music , Volume 13 , Issue 1: Voice , March 2016 , pp. 53 - 76
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press, 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bibliography

Auslander, Philip. Liveness: Performance in a Mediatized Culture. London: Routledge, 1999.Google Scholar
Bangs, Lester. ‘Astral Weeks’, in Stranded: Rock and Roll for a Desert Island, ed. Marcus, Greil. New York: Da Capo, 2007. 178–87.Google Scholar
Barthes, Roland. The Pleasure of the Text, trans. Miller, Richard. New York: Hill and Wang, 1975.Google Scholar
Barthes, Roland. The Responsibility of Forms, trans. Howard, Richard. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991.Google Scholar
Barthes, Roland. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography, trans. Howard, Richard. London: Vintage, 2000.Google Scholar
Buzacott, Martin and Ford, Andrew. Speaking in Tongues: The Songs of Van Morrison. Sydney: ABC Books, 2005.Google Scholar
Calvino, Italo. Under the Jaguar Sun, trans. Weaver, William. London: Penguin, 2002.Google Scholar
Cavarero, Adriana. For More than One Voice: Toward a Philosophy of Vocal Expression, trans. Kottman, Paul A.. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005.Google Scholar
Connor, Steven. Dumbstruck: A Cultural History of Ventriloquism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.Google Scholar
Connor, Steven. Beyond Words: Sobs, Hums, Stutters and other Vocalizations. London: Reaktion, 2014.Google Scholar
Daley, Mike. ‘Patti Smith's “Gloria”: Intertextual Play in a Rock Vocal Performance’. Popular Music 16/3 (1997), 235–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
DeCurtis, Anthony. In Other Words: Artists Talk about Life and Work. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard, 2005.Google Scholar
Deleuze, Gilles.The Logic of Sense, ed. Boundas, Constantin V., trans. Lester, Mark and Stival, Charles. London: Athlone Press, 1990.Google Scholar
Dolar, Mladen. A Voice and Nothing More. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006.Google Scholar
Elliott, Richard. Nina Simone. Sheffield: Equinox, 2013.Google Scholar
Elliott, Richard. The Late Voice: Time, Age and Experience in Popular Music. New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2015.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elliott, Richard. ‘You Can't Just Say “Words”: Literature and Nonsense in the Work of Robert Wyatt’, in Litpop: Writing and Popular Music, ed. Carroll, Rachel and Hansen, Adam. Farnham: Ashgate, 2014. 49–62.Google Scholar
Fish, Mike. ‘Listening to the Lion’. The Wire 92 (1991), 38–41.Google Scholar
Flanagan, Bill. Written in My Soul: Candid Interviews with Rock's Great Songwriters. London: Omnibus, 1990.Google Scholar
Hennion, Antoine. ‘Music and Mediation: Toward a New Sociology of Music’, in The Cultural Study of Music: A Critical Introduction, ed. Clayton, Martin, Herbert, Trevor and Middleton, Richard, 2nd edn. New York: Routledge, 2012. 249–60.Google Scholar
Joyce, James. Finnegans Wake. London: Penguin, 2000.Google Scholar
Marcus, Greil. Listening to Van Morrison. London: Faber & Faber, 2010.Google Scholar
Mark, M. ‘It's Too Late to Stop Now’, in Stranded: Rock and Roll for a Desert Island, ed. Marcus, Greil. New York: Da Capo, 2007. 11–28.Google Scholar
Middleton, Richard. ‘Rock Singing’, in The Cambridge Companion to Singing, ed. Potter, John. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. 28–41.Google Scholar
Middleton, Richard. Voicing the Popular: On the Subjects of Popular Music. New York: Routledge, 2006.Google Scholar
Mills, Peter. ‘Into the Mystic: The Aural Poetry of Van Morrison’. Popular Music 13/1 (1994), 91–103.Google Scholar
Mills, Peter. Hymns to the Silence: Inside the Words and Music of Van Morrison. New York: Continuum, 2010.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Lit Up Inside: Selected Lyrics. London: Faber & Faber, 2014.Google Scholar
Rogan, Johnny. Van Morrison: No Surrender. London: Vintage, 2006.Google Scholar
Shell, Marc. Stutter. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005.Google Scholar
Stewart, Susan. Poetry and the Fate of the Senses. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002.Google Scholar
Turner, Steve. Van Morrison: Too Late to Stop Now. London: Bloomsbury, 1993.Google Scholar
Williams, Paul. Rock and Roll: The 100 Best Singles. Encinitas, CA: Entwhistle Books, 1993.Google Scholar
Wurtzler, Steve. ‘“She Sang Live, but the Microphone was Turned Off”: The Live, the Recorded and the Subject of Representation’, in Sound Theory Sound Practice, ed. Altman, Rick. New York: Routledge, 1992. 87–103.Google Scholar
Yorke, Ritchie. Van Morrison: Into the Music. London: Charisma/Futura, 1975.Google Scholar

Discography

Circle, Inner. ‘Sweat (A La La La La Long)’. 7″ single. Magnet/WEA 9031-77678-7, 1992.Google Scholar
Knight, Beverley. Affirmation. CD. Parlophone 7243 47331022, 2004.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Astral Weeks. LP. Warner Bros. K 46024, 1968.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Moondance. LP. Warner Bros. K 46040, 1970.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Saint Dominic's Preview. LP. Warner Bros. K 46172, 1972.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. It's Too Late to Stop Now. LP. Warner Bros. K86007, 1974.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Common One. LP. Mercury 6302 021, 1980.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Inarticulate Speech of the Heart. LP. Mercury 811 140–4, 1983.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. A Sense of Wonder. LP. Mercury MERH 54, 1985.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Irish Heartbeat. LP. Mercury MERH 124, 1988.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Avalon Sunset. LP. Polydor 839 262-1, 1989.Google Scholar
Morrison, Van. Hymns to the Silence. LP. Polydor 849 026-1, 1991.Google Scholar
Presley, Elvis. ‘All Shook Up’. 7″ single. RCA Victor 47–6870, 1957.Google Scholar