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Van Morrison: Astral Weeks, Movement and Murder · DISGRACELAND

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Disgraceland as a production of Double Elvis, a story about
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Van Morrison's time spent in Cambridge, Massachusetts is kind of crazy.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: He was hiding out from the New York City mafia,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: recently the victim of a physical attack from a Genovese
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: crime family member, and starving and desperately trying to keep
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: his career together. He was playing in a band with
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: a young, talented Emerson College student who would wind up
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: beaten to death in a Beacon Street apartment in a
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: matter of months. Van Morrison was ornery, broke, and reclusive.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Despite early success, first with a seminal rhythm and blues
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: inspired garage rock Outfit Them, and later with his smash
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: solo hit Brown Eyed Girl. For Van though it wasn't enough.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: He wanted more, more great music. That music you heard
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: at the top of the show that wasn't great music.
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: That was a preset loop from my melotron called Church
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: Organ Low MK one. I played you that loop because
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: I can't afford the license for Hey Jude by the Beatles.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: And why would I play you that specific slice of
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: anthemic maca Cheese? Could I afford it? Because that was
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: the number one song in America on November one, nineteen
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: sixty eight, and that was the day that George Ivan
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Morrison aka Van Morrison aka Van the Man would release
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: Astra Weeks, his second solo album, an album that defined
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: grace and beauty but is underpinned by desperation and murder.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: On this episode, Low Church organs anthemic maca Cheese, Astra Weeks,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: Van Morrison's time in case, a ridge mass and a
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: dead guitar player. I'm Jake Brennan, and this, this dis graceland.
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: Finding a musician is easy. Holding onto one is a
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: different story Entirely. Musicians are transient. They come and they go.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: We move through our daily lives, and every couple of
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: months or so, one of our favorite musical artists blows
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: through town for a show. We fork over our hard
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: earned cash, and if we're lucky, the artist is worth it,
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: and the show is transcendent and we get swept away
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: and are given a respite from our otherwise very unrock
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: star lives. Then, after the obligatory encore or two puff,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: they're gone. A small army of hard working roadies and
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: fast talking handlers are thrust into motion to quickly move
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: the musician from our town to someone else's, and musicians
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: not only move from town to town, they move from
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: gig to gig, from band to band, from opportunity to opportunity,
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: in and out of people's lives, from one lover to another,
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: from party to party, drug to drug in and then
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: out of rehab there then gone again. Us civilians, our
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: lives are sedentary by comparison, but for musicians, the rest
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: of the world comes and goes, as do all of
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: the people in it. Few albums convey this sense of
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: transience with as much grace as Van Morrison's landmark long
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: player Asked Weeks. The lyrics are poetic, mournful, melancholic, and
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: in constant struggle with an unwelcome inertia. Astro Weeks is
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: about coming and going about being stuck and with any luck,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: maybe being reborn. In every note, from the sweeping strings
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: to the chugging acoustic guitars and heavy hearted flutes, you
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: feel a sense of trying to get somewhere, a sense
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: of movement, and Van Morrison, who wrote the record, was
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: at the time anything but moving. He was stuck. A
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: five foot five inch chubby sullen, wildly talented and inspired
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: immovable object, hiding out from the New York City mafia
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: in Cambridge, Massachusetts, starving and desperately trying to piece together
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: the makings of a band to get astro Weeks out
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: of his head and onto tape and yes, to get
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: his career moving again. New York City was tough on
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Van Morrison. Despite the success of his first band, Them
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: and their anthemic hit Glria. Gloria, the blue eyed Irish
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: soul singer was broke but bursting at the seams with
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: talent and vision. Van's plan was to bust through the
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: silly haze of the Summer of Love as a serious
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: solo artist. His old school producer Burt Burns, mobbed up
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: in Money Hungry, had other plans and miscast Van as
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: a psychedelic novelty act, a move that, in Van's eyes,
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: threatened to derail the second act of his career before
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: it even got started. So Van attempted to negotiate a
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: release from the draconian contract that bound him. He wound
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: up having his guitar smashed over his head by a
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: Genevese family thug. New York City was dead to him,
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: or if he stayed, would likely be the reason he
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: would wind up. New digs were in demand, so it
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: was off to Cambridge with its flourishing folk scene, rich
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: pool of talented young musicians, and its underground radio station
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: and alternative weekly newspaper across the river in Boston. Yeah,
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: Cambridge would do just fine for a time anyway. The
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: move was about getting his career moving again, not just
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: stucking the mob and one of the people who would
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: help him find his way, a young, gifted, handsome guitar
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: player would mysteriously disappear from Van's life just as quickly
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: as he derived. But it wasn't career opportunities or drugs
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: or alcohol that would move the musician out of Van's
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: world with shockingly quick transience. It was a violent beating
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: inflicted upon him via savage blows to the head with
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: the wooden spindle from a broken banister. All I know
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: is that his name was Rick, he had worked at
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: the Monkeys, and a few weeks after our first show
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: after Astra Weeks was released, he was murdered. That's Van
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: Morrison's Boston based bass player at the time. Tom Kilbania
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: talking about Rick Philp, the guitar player in the first
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: band Van had put together to wood shed the songs
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: that would eventually become Astra Weeks. In nineteen sixty seven,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: when Rick Philp arrived in Boston to attend Emerson College,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: the music industry had already chewed him up and spit
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: him out, but Rick, apparently a glutton for punishment, made
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: himself available for gigs. Nonetheless, Rick's previous band, Middle Class,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: from his hometown of Berkeley Heights, New Jersey, was a
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: pet project of songwriting power couple Carol King and Jerry Goffin,
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: who had taken the band under their tutelage and signed
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: them to their record label, Tomorrow Records. That's how the
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: Monkey's gig happened. But otherwise the band went nowhere. They
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: had a regional following and some good press, but in
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: the grand scheme of things, Rick Phillips band Middle Class
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: was a bust. I mean, they were good, for sure,
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: but you know the drill when your parents are up
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: your butt about how the whole quote unquote music thing
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: is going. How many times could Rick answer with something
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: like pretty good, you know, we just had a great gig.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: Gets some at high school. Last month, this crazy band
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: called Velvet Underground opened up for us. I know they're
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: really going places, and how you know, Carol is going
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: to get this new distribution deal for the label, and
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: even though her and Jerry are on the outside, feel
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: like there's some strong material coming up our way. Blah
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: blah blah blah blah blah blah. What your parents heard
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: was my son is on a fast track to nowhere
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: with this music thing. So the band broke up, but
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: to keep his old man off of his back, Rick
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: decided to head off to Boston to go to school.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: He quickly hooked up with Van Morrison, another young, kind
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: of sort of casualty of the music industry, but one
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: who wasn't equipped for or interested in resigning himself to
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: study groups and campus sit ins. For Van Morrison, school
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: was out, no more teachers, no more books. Van was
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: searching off on some other trip entirely. Playing with Van
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: Morrison was no doubt a boost for Rick philt Van,
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: his current situation, notwithstanding, was a known quantity. Brown Eyed
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: Girl wasn't quite the ubiquitous classic we know it as today,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: but it was still a hit, and Rick knew he
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: was potentially into some thing good, and he and Van
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: hit it off personally. Van seemed to like him, which
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: was saying something because the guy didn't really like anyone,
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: or at least he seemed to not dislike him. They
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: bonded the night Doctor Martin Luther King Junior was shot
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: watching the fallout in disbelief from Van's Cambridgeport apartment, glued
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: to the television. Van knew it then Rick could hang
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: and play. Rick was a good musical match for Van. Instinctually,
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: Rick knew that, as Van was hunting for a sound
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: to pin down, he'd be wise to not paint the
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: surly troubadour into a musical corner with his guitar playing.
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: So Rick hung back and played around Van's phrasing and
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: afforded the singer the space to evolve the songs organically
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: while he sorted astor weeks out in his head, in
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: rehearsal and on stage. For a time, it was all good.
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: Then in a flash, it was Rick's apartment mysteriously caught
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: fire twice. Rick was fine, and so was his roommate. Impossibly,
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: just as important, Rix's guitars were not damaged. All that
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: was lost were some of Rick's clothes and books. But
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: two fires weird right, Rick found it odd but brushed
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: it off. His roommate, Harvey Alter, didn't seem bothered in
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: the least. Then Rick's guitars went missing, stolen right out
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: from under him. Rick was devastated. Having his guitars stolen,
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: effectively losing extensions of himself was crushing, as it would
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: be for any serious guitar player. His roommate had no
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: idea where they went. Nobody did. Rick's roommate, Harvey, was
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: an odd dude. He and Rick had hooked up somehow
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: at Emerson and lived in a little basement apartment on
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: Beacon Street, just across the street from Boston Common, surrounded
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: by gas lit Street Lane entrance with its beautiful public
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: garden and picturesque frog pond. The entire neighborhood at the
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: time screamed old school romance, and romance was what Harvey
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: had in mind, not for his girlfriend, who was more
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: of a beard, but for his good looking guitar slinging roommate,
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: Rick Philp. Harvey Alter was obsessed with Rick, and for
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: whatever reason, Rick was blind to it. Harvey had a
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: weird control over him, or at least he tried to
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: exert some sort of control over him. He repeatedly attempted
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: to sabotage Rick's relationship with his girlfriend, Kathy, who was
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: out of state away at school, but frequently visited Rick
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: at the apartment, and he insisted that when Kathy spent
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: the night that she and Rick leave the bedroom door
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: open so Harvey would not feel left out controlling. Sure,
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: but dude was just fucking weird. We'll be right back
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: after this word word word. Driving home after work one night,
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: Harvey couldn't get his head around the issue of Rick
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: and Kathy. Fucking Kathy always around. Was she moving to
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: Boston to be with Rick or not? Couldn't she take
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: a hint? She wasn't welcome. Harvey hated her, and deep
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: down he knew Rick did too. Rick was just too
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: nice to bring himself to admit it. Rick. Rick was
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: gorgeous and sweet and kind and talented. He loved Rick,
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: and he knew Rick loved him back, even if Rick
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: didn't know it yet. Rick was going places. Carol King
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: thought so. And this new gig Rick had with the
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: angry little Irish guy with that song about the girl
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: with the brown eyes. Shalatti dah shalatti. Damn, this gig
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: had real potential. Yeah, Rick was going places. He was
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: a mover, and he'd take Harvey with him. Harvey just
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: knew it. Once upon a time, not so long ago,
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: Harvey hadn't always been so convinced. That's why he took
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: Rick's guitars. Fucking Rick. Did he really think he was
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: going to travel the world playing guitar without Harvey? Nah?
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: If Harvey couldn't come, then Rick couldn't go either. Musicians
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: always coming and going. Who did they think they were? Anyway?
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: But Harvey now knew that Rick wouldn't leave without him.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: Things were starting to come apart with Kathy, but still
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: Kathy kept coming back around, making a last ditch effort
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: to pin Rick down and boxing Harvey out. Fucking Kathy,
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Harvey had an idea. Scare her away, but do it
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: carefully in a way that wouldn't come back on him
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: and piss off Rick. Harvey couldn't just threaten her. That
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: wouldn't work. He needed to be subtle. That's when the
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: idea hit him. Earlier that night at work, the deli
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: boy in the kitchen nearly cut his finger off on
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: the meat slicer he'd been bumped into by a bus boy.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Lost his footing slipped and his finger ventured into the
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: area where the big rotating blades spun mercilessly. Blood splurted everywhere.
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: Harvey couldn't help but wonder what if the slip the
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: deli boy took was a little more drastic. What if
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: the bus boy knocked into the deli boy hard, causing
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: him to buckle over. And what if the screw cap
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: on that old rickety slicer's feed screw knocked loose? Well,
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: then at that point the rotating blade would surely spin
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: itself off its axle with the power of a tornado
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: and hurl straight toward Kathy's neck. I mean, the buckled
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: over deli boy's neck and then Kathy's head, I mean
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: the deli boy's head. Would well, you get the picture.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: Harvey came home from work at the restaurant with a
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: manic look in his eyes, barged into Rick and Kathy's
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: bedroom and told them what he'd just witnessed. Kathy, you
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: won't believe what I just saw this deli boy at work.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Such a shit really always up in everybody's business. It's
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: no wonder this happened. I mean, karma right. Anyway, he
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: was slicing meat on the meat cutter, you know the
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: kind right with the sharp rotating blade. He slipped while
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: using it because he wasn't careful, probably minding someone else's
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: business or something. Anyway, he slipped, buckled over toward the machine,
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: and at that same exact moment you won't believe this,
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: a screw from the machine came off, and the blade
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: rocketed off its axle and flew right through his neck.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: His head came clean off, crazy right. The blood, My god,
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: the blood. You wouldn't believe it. Poor guy. I mean,
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: he maybe had to come and no one liked him anyway,
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: no one wanted around, you know what I mean. Right,
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: he just couldn't take a hint. And now he's gone,
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: for real, real gone. Rick and Kathy were in shock,
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: Kathy especially. They both knew Harvey was bullshitting them, and
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: they both knew the story was meant to intimidate Kathy.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: Rick wondered why Kathy didn't. She'd picked up on Harvey's
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: fascination with Rick before and tried warning Rick off, but Rick,
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: to this point anyway, was in denial. But this little
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: tall tale changed things. Rick now thought that maybe those
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: fires weren't an accident. All of a sudden, Harvey seemed
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: to Rick to be well off his rocker, And what
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: about his missing guitars? Did Harvey, the devious little prick,
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: have something to do with that too? Rick didn't know,
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: But what he did know was that he needed to
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: get away from this dude. Shortly after, Rick moved out
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: of his apartment with Harvey and into a place in
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: Brighton with a couple of friends from back home. Harvey
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: was just too weird. Safely ensconced in his new digs,
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: Rick busied himself with his music. He was always writing,
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: sending demos out to Carol king in l a recording
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: with a new band he was pulling together, picking up
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: side gigs with Tony Kiniglierro's band Outfielder for the Boston
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: Red Sox and legendary nightclub Prowler, and of course, still
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: lending his considerable talent to whatever it was that Van
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: Morrison was cooking up in his head. Their new combo
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: had a name, the Van Morrison Controversy. Rehearsals at the
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: National Express Recording Studio at three oh four Columbus Avenue
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: in Boston's South End were where the band would begin
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: to hone the musical identity for astral Weeks. The neighborhood
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: at the time was a mix of beauty and grit.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: Expansive brownstones and back alley cobblestones rubbed up against trash strewn,
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: crime ridden streets that in the daytime bustled with working
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: class Bostonians moving through their daily routines. Beauty grit, movement
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: sentiments that would come to dominate the sound of astral Weeks.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: The Van Morrison controversy brought that sound to the stage
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: on April twentieth, nineteen sixty eight. The show was held
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: on Boston con just across from the apartment Rick Philip
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: had shared with Harvey Alter, as part of a festival
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: called Spring Sing, with a bunch of other bands whose
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: names sounded like they were invented inside a hippie Dippy
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: mad Libs, Cliche Machine, Third World Raspberry, the Tangerine Zoo.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: You get the picture. There's a photo from that day
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: of Rick on stage with Van looking at it. You
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: get the vibe of the two men who are standing
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: exactly where they're supposed to be for a moment. Anyway.
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: Van would keep searching for that sound, and Rick would
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: keep searching for those lost guitars. He'd all but given
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: up until one day he got a call from Harvey.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: Harvey had told him that he had quote unquote found
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: Rick's guitars. Rick just needed to come by Harvey's apartment
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: to get them. So on May nineteenth, nineteen sixty nine,
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: Rick Philp descended the stairs to Harvey Alter's basement apartment
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: at two thirty three Beacon Street and knocked on the door.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: Harvey answered, excitedly, happy to see his old friend. Rick
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: was in no mood. He was polite but blunt. He
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: wanted his guitars. He didn't even care how Harvey had
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: come upon them. He just wanted them back. Harvey dodged.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: He was making small talk, acting as if nothing had
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: changed between them since Rick moved out. How are things going,
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: What's new with your music? How's school? That sort of thing.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: Rick kept to the point, where are my guitars? Harvey?
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: Harvey lit a joint, clearly stalling fine. Rick thought, I'll
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: humor him. Things are good, Harvey. I'm thinking of leaving
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: Boston overbreak. Kathy is going to be home from school,
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: and it'd be good to be with her for a while.
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: Then after that who knows, La maybe probably maybe New York.
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: All Harvey heard was I'm leaving Boston. Harvey started whining
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: to Rick. He couldn't leave, he just had to stay
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: in Boston. They had so much to do together. They
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: were just getting started, Rick, I'm in love with you,
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: you know. Rick of course knew that despite the girlfriends,
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: Harvey was gay, but Rick didn't care so long as
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: he didn't come on to him. He politely let Harvey
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: down gently. What all Harvey heard was I'm leaving Boston.
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: I don't love you. I never loved you. Harvey moved
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: closer to Rick and tried to pull him in. Forget
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: the proclamations, show him how much you love him. Rick
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: pulled away. This just wasn't his thing, he protested. All
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: Harvey heard was I'm leaving Boston. I don't love you,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: I never loved you. You're gay, I'm not. Harvey wasn't
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: taking over an answer. Rick just needed to be shown
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: how good it could be between them. Now. Rick up
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: pissed and angrily pushed Harvey away, told him to leave
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: him the hell alone and give him his guitars and
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: he'd be out of there. What all Harvey heard was
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: I'm leaving Boston. I don't love you, I never loved you.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: You're gay, I'm not fuck off. Harvey snapped, fucking Rick.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: Who did he think he was? Did he think he
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: could just leave, just go and be with someone else,
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: move away? No, If Harvey couldn't have Rick, then nobody
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: could have Rick. Harvey grabbed him. A struggle ensued. Harvey
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: threw Rick back into the short staircase leading out of
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: the apartment. His fall broke the banister. On his way down.
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Rick clumsily tried getting to his feet. Harvey grabbed one
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: of the banister's spindles that had broken off. It was
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: perfect fit perfectly into his hand. Rick was moving for
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: the door. Harvey was blind with rage outside of himself,
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: off on some other trip entirely. Fear, shame, loneliness, and
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: sexual excitement all banged violently together inside Harvey's head, while
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: Harvey violently brought the banister's spindle, banging down under Rick's
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: head with boote force. When it was over, Harvey came
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: too what had he done? Rick was hurt badly. Harvey
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: had it together enough to pull Rick into his bed
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: and put him under the covers, but that was about it.
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: For three and a half days, while Rick lay mortally
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: wounded in his bed, Harvey slowly lost his mind, pacing
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: the apartment, taking turns, mumbling to himself and screaming in horror. Finally,
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: Rick's head wounds, left untreated, proved to be too much,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: and the young musician with the bright future died dead
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: or not. Harvey finally had his man. He'd stopped the
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: young musician, Rick Philp, the object of his obsession, from moving,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: no small feat, given that musicians are like sharks. They
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: stopped moving and they die. Van Morrison knew this. You
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: can hear it in every note of astra Weeks. Van
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: was searching on a quest, figuratively and literally, moving on
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: from the first phase of his moving on from one
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: sound to the next, moving on from the musician he
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: was to the musician he was to become, from the
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: man he was to the man he was to become.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: Movement equals life, which is why astral Weeks sounds so vibrant.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: There's transience and grace in every note. The album is alive,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: Rick Philp is dead. When police finally showed up at
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: Harvey Alter's apartment, responding to a neighbor calling in what
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: was described as disturbing sounds coming from the basement. Harvey
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: answered the door and immediately told the police he's dead.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: I killed him. I killed Rick. Rick. Philp moved in
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: and then out of Van Morrison's life with the quickness,
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: just as many people before and since have done, and
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Van Morrison keeps moving just as musicians do, making more records,
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: playing more shows, doing what a musician does. Astra Weeks
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: would become Van Morrison's landmark creative statement. It is a masterpiece.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: Sure it doesn't have the hits of some Evan's other works,
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: but ask any musician about it and they'll like you
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: tell you that it's his best album. That is, if
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: you can get one of them to stop moving long
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: enough to talk to you. I'm Jake Brennan and this
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: is Disgraceland. Disgraceland was created by Yours Truly and is
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: can be found on the show notes page at disgracelamdpod
• 25:45
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• 25:49
  Speaker 1: thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it.
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