30 days, 30 albums - Van Morrison: Beautiful Vision

Still my favourite Van album – it just sounds so good, and it features one of Van's best recording and live bands. The horn solos are perfect and the arrangements are wonderful, from the opening groove of ‘Celtic Ray’ to the shady summer afternoon melancholy of ‘She Gives Me Religion’. I know there are a dozen other Van masterpieces out there – Saint Dominic and Astral Weeks and Veedon Fleece and all that. But I keep coming back to this one.