Almost exactly 50 years ago today, on March 28, 1967, Van Morrison and Bert Berns went into a studio for a two-day session for Bang Records.  The results of this session gave Morrison a signature song but also led to eventual trouble between the artist and label, unauthorized albums, and legal entanglements.  Morrison's released Bang material has been reissued and his unreleased Bang sessions have been bootlegged many times over the subsequent five decades, but now Legacy Recordings is bringing all of the material together for the first time, officially authorized by Morrison, as The Authorized Bang Collection, a 3-CD set due on April 28.

After leaving the group Them in late 1966, Van Morrison was convinced by songwriter-producer-entrepreneur Bert Berns to come to New York and record for his Bang Records label.  Berns had written and produced 1965's "Here Comes The Night," a No. 2 U.K. hit for Them.  Berns presented Morrison with a contract, which he signed without consulting a lawyer.  The original Bang session was meant to produce songs for singles only and, indeed, "Brown Eyed Girl" was released in mid-June 1967.  The song climbed to No. 10 on the U.S. charts and would become one of the most famous and covered songs of the 1960s.  Trying to capitalize on the single's success, Bang released an 8-song album entitled Blowin' Your Mind! in September of 1967.  It would go to No. 11 in the UK.  Unfortunately, no one at Bang asked or told Morrison they were planning this album.  He only discovered it after its release and was not at all pleased, not even liking the cover of the album.  When Bert Berns died in December 1967, Morrison got into a contract dispute with Berns' widow Ilene.  She prevented him from recording or performing for a time.  Eventually, Warner Bros. bought out Morrison's Bang contract.  To fulfill his obligations to Bang, he returned to the studio and recorded a group of songs that Ilene Berns dubbed "nonsense."  These "contractual obligation" recordings have become infamous over the years and have been bootlegged many times on many formats including CD.

However, Bang was not done with Morrison's recordings.  When he began to have success at Warner Bros. with Astral Weeks and Moondance, Bang decided to reissue some of his old songs.  They first released The Best of Van Morrison in 1970, containing 5 songs from Blowin' Your Mind! and 5 previously unreleased recordings.  In 1973, T.B. Sheets was released.  It contained six repeats of old songs, but also premiered early versions of "Beside You" and "Madame George" which Morrison had reworked for Astral Weeks.

In the CD era, T.B. Sheets was reissued by Columbia in 1990.  The next year, Legacy offered an overview of this period with Bang Masters.  This 18-track compilation presented all of the songs from the Bang albums together with the single only track "Chick-A-Boom."  It also premiered a couple of alternate takes and demos.  However, all of the tracks were newly remixed for the CD.  In 1998, Legacy reissued Blowin' Your Mind!, still in remixed form, adding 5 more alternate takes.

The new package from Legacy presents the Bang recordings in their original mixes on Disc 1.  Disc 2 has the single versions of "Brown Eyed Girl" and "Ro Ro Rosey" together with 13 alternate takes, the majority of which are previously unreleased.  The only takes which appear to have been dropped from previous reissues are different alternates of "Spanish Rose," "Ro Ro Rosey" and "Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye)."  Take 6 of "Brown Eyed Girl" was also on a previous reissue but it looks to have been edited together with several other alternate takes for this new compilation.  The third disc contains the first official appearance of the "contractual obligation recordings."  The set has compiled and produced by Andrew Sandoval, who has also written the liner notes.  In addition, Van Morrison has contributed notes to the set.  Morrison, who had been critical of Bert Berns in the past, says this about Berns in the new set: "Bert Berns was a genius He was a brilliant songwriter and he had a lot of soul, which you don't find nowadays."

We've got the full tracklisting below together with preorder links if you'd like to revisit Van Morrison's first, landmark solo recordings.

Van Morrison, The Authorized Bang Collection (Legacy Recordings, 2017) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Disc 1- The Original Masters

1. Brown Eyed Girl [original stereo mix]
2. He Ain't Give You None [original stereo mix]
3. T.B. Sheets [original stereo mix]
4. Spanish Rose [original stereo mix]
5. Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye) [original stereo mix]
6. Ro Ro Rosey [original stereo mix]
7. Who Drove The Red Sports Car [original stereo mix]
8. Midnight Special [original stereo mix]
9. It's All Right [original stereo mix]
10. Send Your Mind [original stereo mix]
11. The Smile You Smile [original stereo mix]
12. The Back Room [original stereo mix] (5:26)
13. Joe Harper Saturday Morning [original stereo mix] (2:55)
14. Beside You [original mono mix]
15. Madame George [original mono mix]
16. Chick-A-Boom [original mono mix]
17. The Smile You Smile [demo]

Disc 2 - Bang Sessions and Rarities

1. Brown Eyed Girl [original edited mono single mix]
2. Ro Ro Rosey [original mono single mix with backing vocals]
3. T.B. Sheets [Take 2] *
4. Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye) [Takes 10 & 11] *
5. Send Your Mind [Take 3] *
6. Midnight Special [Take 7]
7. He Ain't Give You None (Take 4)
8. Ro Ro Rosey [Take 2] *
9. Who Drove The Red Sports Car (Take 6)
10. Beside You [Take 2] *
11. Joe Harper Saturday Morning [Take 2] *
12. Beside You [Take 5] *
13. Spanish Rose [Take 14] (4:23) *
14. Brown Eyed Girl [Takes 1-6] *
15. Brown Eyed Girl [Takes 7-11] *

Disc 3 - Contractual Obligation Session

1. Twist And Shake
2. Shake And Roll
3. Stomp And Scream
4. Scream And Holler
5. Jump And Thump
6. Drivin' Wheel
7. Just Ball
8. Shake It Mable
9. Hold On George
10. The Big Royalty Check
11. Ring Worm
12. Savoy Hollywood
13. Freaky If You Got This Far
14. Up Your Mind
15. Thirty Two
16. All The Bits
17. You Say France And I Whistle
18. Blowin' Your Nose
19. Nose In Your Blow
20. La Mambo
21. Go For Yourself
22. Want A Danish
23. Here Comes Dumb George
24. Chickee Coo
25. Do It
26. Hang On Groovy
27. Goodbye George
28. Dum Dum George
29. Walk And Talk
30. The Wobble
31. Wobble And Ball

Disc 1, Tracks 1-8 from Blowin' Your Mind, Bang Records LP BLP 218, 1967
Disc 1, Tracks 9-13 from The Best of Van Morrison, Bang Records LP BLP 222, 1970
Disc 1, Tracks 14-15 from T.B. Sheets, Bang Records LP BLP -400, 1973
Disc 1, Track 16 and Disc 2, Track 2 from Bang Single B-552, 1967
Disc 1, Track 17 and Disc 2, Track 7 from Bang Masters, Epic/Legacy CD EK 47041, 1991
Disc 2, Track 1 from Bang Single B-545, 1967
Disc 2, Tracks 3-5, 8, 10-15 and Disc 3, Tracks 1-31 Previously Unreleased
Disc 2, Tracks 6, 9 from Blowin' Your Mind! Expanded Edition, Epic/Legacy CD ZK 65751, 1998