Van the Man stories

Right here's a couple of apocryphal Van Morrison stories.

So, a pal of ours is a super Van the Man fan, I mean, loves him to death. Finally after waiting years for the chance, gets tickets to see The Man at The Beacon Theater on Broadway in Manhattan and is over the moon. The evening of the show comes, our pal gets tuned up in anticipation and arrives early and takes his seat. The band comes out vamps for a bit and out comes Van who does the first number for 20 mins then launches straight into 2nd number which goes 10 mins, and same with the 3rd song and as it winds down Van leaves the stage. Show over. No encore, no 4th song, no sorry i've got a pain in me bollix, not quite 40 minutes and finito! It's over.

Our pal is gobsmacked, vexed- literally steam coming out of his ears. He's unable to move for a bit but then goes up the theater into the lobby past the bar full of other dazed punters and instead of using Broadway main egress, he goes out the back fire door, and right there is the limo door open with the driver behind the wheel and Van bolts out the theater and scoots into the back of the limo now followed closelyby our pal intent on mayhem and who launches himself like a Van-seeking-Missile across the pavement into the back of the car grabbing the great star by the lapels while Van's eyes bug out of his head. Fortunately for Van the concert security boys saw this and latched onto our friend's ankles and dragged him out of the limo. Slam goes the car door as the big car tears away from the curb with the still-quivering Belfast Cowboy ensconced in the rear.

Here's another story for ye. When they held the Bob Dylan 30th anniv. fest at Madison Square Garden with George Harrison, Tom Petty, Lou Reed, etc in 1992, they held the after-party @ Tommy Makem's Bar, a long time fixture in NY. My pal Brendan Cregan local Gaelic Football legend and barman, was hired to work the after party at Makem's. He told me Eric (recently sober) Clapton and man-of-the-hour Bob Dylan sat at a table in the restaurant, each picking at a plate of food, and never said a word to each other the entire meal. This, in a bar packed full of the top of the Rock & Roll royalty, celebrating one of their heroes.