Morning:
14°c
At the weekend, I joined a rapturous, fiftysomething audience at the Royal Albert Hall for the Van Morrison gig (I think the youngest person there was Otis Ferry). The set was tighter than yesterday's Budget, his instrumental ability astonishing, his command of the 15-piece band total, his mastery of his material impeccable, his capacity to drink water diabetic, his voice unmatched in power and range.
But somehow, every time I looked at Van, this thought kept intruding (especially since at full throttle he looked strangely like a dishevelled, sopping Christopher Hitchens after that waterboarding experiment, and his legendary acoustic guitarist looked a lot like Alexander Chancellor, only on a very bad day). In the first set, Morrison wore a baggy dark grey suit and his trademark hat, from which hair of a violent titian hue exuded luxuriantly. In the second half, things got more challenging as he came on stage in a brave ensemble of leather blouson with matching leather trousers. And my thought was - how would the lookist panel of Britain's Got Talent react to the first sight of Van?
I tried to imagine the sniggers, the meaningful glances. But you know what? I couldn't. I concluded that for him, unlike for Susan Boyle and her 100 million views on YouTube, appearance would never be a similar issue.
He sang his songs, that he wrote and played himself. There were ugly scenes of rapture as a greying, paunchy audience of 6,000 rocked out to a storming finale of Gloria. We loved everything about it unconditionally, despite the awful hair and the fact that almost anyone on stage looked like a boozehound hack in late middle-age (a look I happen to find almost irresistible). And all not because Van is the Man - which he is without question - but ... a man.
* I am enjoying Amanda Craig's Dickensian new novel, Hearts and Minds. It is brave, ambitious and funny. There is a wicked portrayal of a magazine called the Rambler that is clearly based on the Spectator during its Doughty Street/Sextator period, with a cast of lungers and hangers-on and persistent poets. Can't wait to see to whom literary editor Mark Amory sends her for review.
* I like Tom Conran's cool head (below) in the face of the rate hikes and business squeeze on Notting Hill and Portobello (please sign, if you haven't, the petition at www.ipetitions.com/petition/saveportobelloandgolbornerdfromb against the scrapping of concessionary rates for small businesses). There's a sign in his diner, Lucky Seven, that says "Pay by the Clock". So if you go at 5pm, your bacon cheeseburger costs just £5, and so on. This happy burger hour lasts till 7pm. The fries are pretty good, too.
