Van Morrison–The Way Young Lovers Do

Enough with analyzing the doom and gloom of youth.  Instead, it’s time to celebrate it with Van Morrison.  Appearing on the halfway point of Astral Weeks, The Way Young Lovers Do is the album’s shortest, most straightforward song, even featuring something of a chorus.  The upbeat, jazzy, trumpet and xylophone-puncutated waltz is a tribute to the kind of love that only the young are capable of.  “Then we sat on our own star and dreamed of the way that we were and the way that we wanted to be,” sings Morrison, in a drunken thrall of romance.  Everything seems possible, including happiness.  It’s the sort of overt joy that a lot of great songs aren’t able to address.  There’s no emotional conflict here.  Morrison’s vocals burst with an overwhelming ecstasy that spills over into the raucous gaggle of instruments as he recounts the simple act of kissing a girl goodnight on her doorstep.  It’s a buzz of elation preserved perfectly in scattered, scatting whirl.