Product Description

When Van Morrison released 1986's NO GURU, NO METHOD, NO TEACHER, he'd spent the better part of the '80s rediscovering himself through spiritual pursuits ranging from born-again Christianity to dabblings with Scientology. Morrison's introspection led to his writing songs for GURU pertaining to everything from actively re-exploring his roots ("Got To Go Back") to the spiritual battle between good and evil ("Here Comes The Knight"). Part of this rebirth involved a heavy dose of Celtic mysticism in the shape of "Tir Na Nog" and "In The Garden", a song which included the album's title in its lyrics in an off-handed swipe at those critics trying to trivialise his religious explorations. Although the heavy-duty imagery on this record left many fans of Morrison's lighter, swinging '70s material puzzled, the marriage of beautiful musical arrangements and magical lyrical compositions makes NO GURU an overlooked gem in the canon of the Belfast Cowboy.

Track Listing

1. Got To Go Back
2. Oh The Warm Feeling
3. Foreign Window
4. Town Called Paradise
5. In The Garden
6. Tir Na Nog
7. Here Comes The Night
8. Thanks For The Information
9. One Irish Rover
10. Ivory Tower

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #92008 in Music
• Released on: 1998-04-06
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Original recording remastered

Amazon.co.uk Review
Long-time Van Morrison fans may prefer the Belfast bard's tougher, emphatically R&B-driven work, yet it's his lusher, mid-1980s output that helped him consolidate the scrappy gains made in the prior decades. The once-heightened polarity between the earthy and the ethereal seemed muted on albums that traded in a softer-focus, romantic mysticism mirrored by the expanded scale of Morrison's band and arrangements, and left room for him to dabble in instrumental compositions or his renewed love of sax and piano. No Method, No Guru, No Teacher proves among the more durable, convincing chapters in this era, carrying a now-familiar array of symbolic touchstones (the Celtic legacy of "Tir Na Nog" or an extended instrumental allusion to a hymn set to William Blake's musings on England) and offering two of Morrison's better meditations on redemption, "In the Garden" and "A Town Called Paradise", which echoes the fevered waltz-time trance of "Astral Weeks" itself. --Sam Sutherland

Customer Reviews

A spiritual experience.
Over his long career Van Morrison has produced a number of outstanding albums covering a variety of musical styles - 1986's "No Guru, no Method, no Teacher", for me, is one of those outstanding albums of his.

Lyrically, on "No Guru...", Van often explores spiritual themes from a very human perspective, drawing on a number of his experiences to comment on various threads of spiritual teaching. Not a new theme to him, of course, even back in 1986 - it works particularly well on this album because the musical arrangements are wonderfully inventive and evocative.

The band that Van has playing on this album is truly first class and the musical arrangements, tending towards jazz but not uncomfortably so, delightful. Take away Van's vocals and the music would still be wonderful to listen to unaccompanied - quite bewitching and mantric - I suppose you could say that it suits the spiritual subject matter very well.

As well as the usual instruments to be found in rock music arrangements, Van has provided for tenor and soprano saxophones, trumpet, cor anglais, oboe, harp and strings. Given the vocalisations and arrangements, it would be fair to add to this the wonderful female backing singers. The fusion of all these parts is what makes for a truly wonderful album, one of his greats. Hearing it IS a spiritual experience.

Firmly back on track with the best album of his middle period, a great accomplishment after some original but patchy offerings
I remember buying this as soon as it was released, and rushing home to see if the promising reviews were correct. Ivory Tower had been released as a single ahead of the album and I'd heard it on the radio, radio, raayayayayayaydioowoooooooo. It sounded poppy, a typical single, and I liked the tone. All VM albums have a different tone to them, a different sound (they did before he started churning out his dire old man r&b identikit albums in the mid 90s anyway). The depth of quality unveiled as I reached the end of the first side, I have to say surprised even me. This was a stonking piece of work, as deep and meaningful as anything I'd ever heard while losing none of that lovely melody and voice work he is noted for. This is a truly beautiful album, with hardly a dull track on it. If you like Van being deep and mystical rather than going over and over the same bluesy old ground of his youth, there are a few albums of note to choose from, yes by all means go to Veedon Fleece, it is mostly sensational-but overall, track for track, I think this is the best of them.

Musical Meditation
I own nothing to compete with this album. Hypnotising from the first note it flows through each track like one continuous song. Then, with a snap of the fingers that is 'Ivory Tower' you come-to thinking you've experienced a wonderfully indulgent and very insular journey, compelling you to press again just to escape back inside.