"Bulbs"
Single by Van Morrison
from the album Veedon Fleece
B-side
ReleasedNovember 1974
RecordedMarch 1974, Mercury Studios, New York City, United States
Genre
Length4:19
LabelWarner Bros.
Songwriter(s)Van Morrison
Producer(s)Van Morrison
Van Morrison singles chronology
"Ain't Nothing You Can Do"
(1974)		 "Bulbs"
(1974)		 "Caldonia"
(1974)

"Bulbs" is a song written by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison. It was the only single to be taken from his 1974 album Veedon Fleece, with a B-side of "Cul de Sac" for the US release and "Who Was That Masked Man" for the UK release.[2][3]

Recording and composition

"Bulbs" was first recorded with different lyrics at the recording session for the 1973 album, Hard Nose the Highway, released in 1973.[4] After the first recording session for Veedon Fleece, "Bulbs" was re-cut at Mercury Studios in New York City in March 1974, along with "Cul de Sac" to give it a more rock feeling. According to Jef Labes this was "cause he (Morrison) didn't feel they had the right feeling... It was me, Van and a bunch of other guys that he'd never played with."[5] Bass player Joe Macho had previously played on the 1966 Bobby Hebb hit song "Sunny".

"Bulbs" has been described as "a pleasant, catchy country ditty, a Dire Straits song before its time" by biographer John Collis.[6] As with many of Morrison's songs, "Bulbs" does not have a clear story line, but in part focuses on immigration to the United States as in the lines:

She's leaving Pan American
Suitcase in her hand
I said her brothers and her sisters
Are all on Atlantic sand

Critical reception

Record World called it "Something like a performance from his Astral Weeks days with a graft of pedal steel" and said that "Van benefits from a renewed power surge."[7]

In an interview with Morrison, Tom Donahue said, after he had listened to "Bulbs": "You always make great noises. The other things you do in songs beside the words."[8]

In a Stylus Magazine review for the album Veedon Fleece, Derek Miller says of the song:[9]

"Of course, the best and most immediately memorable song on Veedon Fleece is "Bulbs". Coming about as close to laying down a groove as he does on the album, the song quickly makes dust of its acoustic start, leaping headstrong into a Waylon Jennings' style bass-roll, rump heavy and plush, pianos shimmering and fingerdense."

Morrison performed the song on the German television show Musikladen on 13 November 1974.[10]

Title

The title might come from the lines:

And her batteries are corroded
And her hundred watt bulb just blew
or the repeated chorus:
.. she's standing in the shadows
Where the street lights all turn blue

Personnel

Other releases

A live performance of this song is featured on the 1974 disc of Morrison's 2006 issued DVD, Live at Montreux 1980/1974. Morrison used a stripped-down band on this Montreaux Jazz Festival appearance consisting of:

Covers

Notes

  1. ↑ Segretto, Mike (2022). "1974". 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Minute - A Critical Trip Through the Rock LP Era, 1955–1999. Backbeat. pp. 301–302. ISBN 9781493064601.
  2. ↑ "Van Morrison – Bulbs" – via www.45cat.com.
  3. ↑ "Van Morrison – Bulbs" – via www.45cat.com.
  4. ↑ Heylin, Can You Feel the Silence? p. 521
  5. ↑ Heylin, Can You Feel the Silence? p. 284
  6. ↑ Collis, Inarticulate Speech of the Heart, pp. 140–141
  7. ↑ "Single Picks" (PDF). Record World. 28 September 1974. p. 12. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
  8. ↑ Hinton, Celtic Crossroads, p. 179
  9. ↑ "Van Morrison – Veedon Fleece". stylusmagazine.com. Retrieved 3 August 2008.
  10. ↑ "Lights, Camera, Backbeat – Search". www.lightscamerabackbeat.com.
  11. ↑ Hal Horowitz (5 August 2003). "Vanthology: A Tribute to Van Morrison – Van Morrison | Songs, Reviews, Credits, Awards". AllMusic. Retrieved 15 February 2014.
  12. ↑ Stegall, Tim. "Jason Boland & the Stragglers: Hard Times Are Relative Album Review". The Austin Chronicle.

References

  • Collis, John (1996). Inarticulate Speech of the Heart, Little Brown and Company, ISBN 0-306-80811-0
  • Heylin, Clinton (2003). Can You Feel the Silence? Van Morrison: A New Biography, Chicago Review Press ISBN 1-55652-542-7
  • Hinton, Brian (1997). Celtic Crossroads: The Art of Van Morrison, Sanctuary, ISBN 1-86074-169-X
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