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Baker's Dozen

Coming Back To Beauty: Kevin Rowland's Favourite Music
Fergal Kinney , August 19th, 2020 08:16

Kevin Rowland guides Fergal Kinney through the songs that saved him, from self-discovery as a musician through the saving grace of music in recovery from drug addiction. Rowland portrait by Eliza Hill.

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Van Morrison - 'Madame George'
So it was a first date, we were in a wine bar and the woman who was running the place, she's playing Astral Weeks. I'd never heard it. The first time I thought, this sounds like he's making it up as he goes along, the lyrics and the melodies. The second time, I was starting to get into it. By the third time, I was just sat there on this date like "Jesus, this is really something." So these things just landed at the same time and they got me into Van.

Van Morrison then becomes a bit of an influence on Too-Rye-Aye, his version of 'I Believe to My Soul' you can kind of link with 'Until I Believe In My Soul'

No, no, no. OK, well, on Too-Rye-Aye, I think 'Until I Believe In My Soul' there are some bits that are a little too Van. That ad lib, that's a bit too influenced by Van, but look - we covered Jackie Wilson Said, but we trumpeted it, we weren't trying to rip it off. There's so many influences on Too-Rye-Aye too, there's pop, soul, strings, Irish, Tamla. Something like 'Liars A-to-E', that sounds to me like '65, '66 Dylan.