Van Morrison / His Band and the Street Choir / 1970
Blue Money
loose, flirtatious, celebratory
A buoyant, playful song built around a photo shoot, where the singer coaxes a model through poses while imagining the payday and pleasure waiting on the other side. It's less a narrative than a mood piece — loose, funky, and celebratory of easy money and easy living.
playful eroticism work as flirtation material pleasure spontaneity and joy performance and voyeurism
Who's speaking
A photographer or director figure addresses a model directly, coaxing and encouraging her through the session while fantasizing about what comes after; the tone is affectionate and teasing rather than exploitative in intent, though the power dynamic is worth noting.
What happens
The song opens mid-session, with the speaker directing his subject through poses and breaks. As it progresses, the focus shifts from the immediate scene to anticipation — the promise of freedom and spending once the work is done. By the end, the song abandons narrative altogether, dissolving into a chant-like celebration of money itself as sound and feeling.
How it's built
Built on a simple verse-chorus loop that mirrors the repetitive rhythm of a photo shoot — command, pause, repeat. The song's back half breaks from structure entirely, shedding verses for a vamped outro of ad-libbed money-word variations, turning the song into a groove-based incantation rather than a story.
Section by section
Opening verse
The speaker addresses someone directly, walking her through small physical actions — smiling, resting, counting a pose. The tone is casual and intimate, establishing the session as a shared, almost playful labor rather than a formal shoot.for a while.},{{
Craft
- repetition
- Phrases like the count for a pose and the invitation to rest recur almost verbatim, mimicking the rhythm of directing a shoot and reinforcing the song's hypnotic, working groove.
- synecdoche
- The recurring money variations (juice, loose, blue) treat cash as a physical, almost sensory substance, standing in for freedom, pleasure, and looseness rather than literal currency.
- vocal ad-lib as structure
- Morrison's improvised interjections and moaned syllables function structurally, replacing conventional lyrics in the song's second half and turning voice into instrument.
Reading it
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Context
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About Van Morrison
Sir George Ivan Morrison is a Northern Irish musician, singer, and songwriter whose recording career started in the 1960s. Morrison's albums have performed well in the UK and Ireland, with more than 40 reaching the UK Top 40, as well as internationally, including in the United States, Germany, and the Netherlands.
b. 1945 / Northern Ireland
Full biography and catalogue