Although Blowin’ Your Mind! is technically Van Morrison’s first solo album it feels more like a work in transition. In his short work with Them, Van had pushed to the outermost limits of what he could do when constrained by a band, while his next two solo releases, Astral Weeks and Moondance, would be two of the greatest ever recorded. From that perspective, Blowin’ Your Mind! plays as Van elasticising and expanding into his individual voice. Of course, the album is something of a showpiece for “Brown Eyed Girl,” the opening track, and easily the most distinctive.

Yet the remaining seven pieces also have their fair share of interesting and memorable moments. In effect, they feel like Van calibrating his inimitable Celtic drawl against the lineage of soul and blues, meaning that they’re somewhat generic at heart but also operate as a platform for some really delightful and idiosyncratic flourishes. In particular, Van’s gift for storytelling is on full display here, with occasional turns of phrase evoking whole narratives, often through tropes – such as “the avenue” – that would become perennial in his later work.

From that perspective, the most astonishing track is the nine-minute long “T.B. Sheets,” in which Van takes the parched dryness of the blues and applies it to a tuberculosis sickbed, gasping for air with a flourish that anticipates the growling of “Listen to the Lion” some five years later. In much of his music Van feels prematurely aged or just ageless, so there’s also something startling about the sheer youthfulness of the song cycle here – most of them are positively adolescent, and focus on high school crushes. “Brown Eyed Girl” aside, Blowin’ Your Mind may be an apprentice album but it’s sheer potential is quite extraordinary