As wonderfully nostalgic as ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ is, the birth of that evergreenwas so unruly. In any case, it became the song that made Van Morrison worldfamous.
Sasha Van Der SpeetenDecember 10, 202203:00
In September of this year, Northern Ireland’s Belfast unpacked a brand new VanMorrison Walking Tour, a tourist walk through places in the city that featuredin Van’s classic songs. You stroll along Cypress Avenue (the song of the samename is on the mighty Astral Weeks), Hyndford Street, where his childhood homestood, and The Beechie River (both from ‘On Hyndford Street’) or along theOrangefield High School. Most of the selfies will be taken at Hollow Grove, apatch of greenery that Van used to get into mischief in his childhood andwhich forms the backdrop for ‘Brown Eyed Girl’. “Hey, where did we go?”, hemuses, “Days when the rain came / Down in The Hollow / Playin ‘ a new game /Laughing and a running / Skipping and a jumping / In the misty morning fogwith our hearts a thumpin.”
Now Van Morrison colored all that nostalgia with a touch of poetic license.Into the mine “Going down the old mine / With a transistor radio”, wouldreally have been no more than an old bong, just big enough for little Van andhis comrades to slide through. The waterfall in ” All along the waterfallwith you” did not exist: in The Hollow there are at most streams of water.When Van hides behind a rainbow wall with his brown-eyed lover – “Standing inthe sunlight laughing / Hiding behind a rainbow ‘s wall” – refers to achipped piece of wall that once belonged to the Rainbow candy store.
The Van Morrison who recorded ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ in March 1967 in New York’sA&R Studios may have been brimming with inspiration, but he was by no meanscarefree. His band Them had just split up and he was practically broke. Hisfate lay in the hands of producer Bert Berns, a veteran who had packed thestudio with the very best session musicians including guitarists Al Gorgoni,and Hugh McCracken who later said “there was something special in the air thatday”. Moreover, it was Gorgoni who came up with the iconic guitar tune thatkicks off ‘Brown Eyed Girl’.
Censorship
“At the start of the session, Van was a shy, withdrawn 21-year-old,” CissyHouston of backing vocalist The Sweet Inspirations recalled. “But as soon asthe tape started, it was like a sparking power cable, full of ideas andimprovisation. By the end he was scathing like a madman, soaking wet withsweat.”
Van partly got the basis for the song from ‘Brownskin Gal’ by the BahamianJoseph Spence. Berns, who had lived in Havana, was also not averse to somemambo and calypso and based the song on a simplified Afro-Caribbean rhythm. Bythe way, the song was originally called “Brown Skinned Girl,” a title that VanMorrison reportedly changed mindlessly during the writing process. “After therecordings I looked at the tape box and saw ‘brown eyed girl’. I even forgotthat I had changed the title. Or did Van and his retinue fear the wrath of theultra-conservative media at the time? A single who sings about an interracialrelationship could be banned.
Censorship came anyway, but then because of the text line “Making love in thegreen grass / Behind the stadium with you”. Some radios thought that was toorancid. So Van recorded a chaste version: “Laughing and a running, hey hey,behind the stadium”. Everyone satisfied.