Van Morrison was born in Belfast in 1945, the son of a shipyard worker who collected American blues and jazz records.

According to his press kit that accompanies his new CD, Keep it Simple (Lost Highway Records), Van grew up listening to the music of Muddy Waters, Mahalia Jackson, Lightnin' Hopkins and John Lee Hooker. Surrounded by every kind of musical influence - country, blues, jazz, and folk - from 13 he was playing guitar, sax and harmonica with a series of local Irish showbands, skiffle and rock'n'roll groups. The rest, as they say, is history.

As he reaches the winter period of both his life and career, Morrison has been mining the blues and jazz records of his youth for inspiration. He started in earnest with the criminally underrated Too Long in Exile in 1993 and has struck creative gold in recent years with classic records like The Healing Game and the brilliant Back on Top in 1999.

On Keep it Simple Morrison seems to be taking the long view of life with lines like "had my rise/had my downfall/now I am going to rise again," on "How Can a Poor Boy." It's a slow burner that opens the collection, and while you normally wouldn't use "sassy" and "gospel" in the same sentence the church flavor reveals a playful side of the reclusive arranger that is thoroughly infectious.

Another nod to Van's advancing years comes when he labels himself "a bore" and sings, "I'm not a legend in my own mind/I don't need booze to unwind," as a way of saying "no dice" to booze on the crotchety blues of "Don't Go to Nightclubs Anymore."

He does divert from these mortal matters to get in touch with his inner mojo on the soul ditty "That's Entrainment." No, that's not a typo, and who knew this was a word? I thought it was spelled wrong, but I actually found out that entrainment means "to carry along (a dissimilar substance, as drops of liquid) during a given process, as evaporation or distillation.

Not sure how lyrics like "making me holler when you come around" and "shaking your money maker" has to do with this process. Then again, soul is about feeling, and this guy has soul to burn. Making sense in the song is optional.

With the exception of a few playful diversions like The Skiffle Sessions and a couple of country albums thrown in for good measure, Van's recent collections are starting to sound like one blues shuffle running into the other when you stack them alongside one another on your iPod.

Don't get me wrong - I love the blues, and few people deliver it with more conviction than Van does. But after 15 years in the same garden, the soil might need some turning over to produce a more satisfying harvest.

Perhaps a disc of Depeche Mode or Megadeth covers to clean the ol' palette might be in order? Or maybe not.

Van's latter work has also been marred with complaints about being famous. On tracks like "Just Like Greta" and "They Sold Me Out" from his previous CD, Magic Time, he made it clear that he wanted to be left alone.

I wasn't aware that this was a problem, Van! Paris Hilton and Britney's see through dresses have the tabloids salivating, not you! It also comes off as being a tad indulgent to complain about fame when you have the nerve to charge a king's ransom for a ticket at the WaMu Center here in Manhattan.

Without the fame, he would be slinging riffs for lunch money at a smaller venue like BB King's. Deal with it, dude! Mercifully, he keeps that griping to a bare minimum on Keep it Simple.

Let's talk about that legendary Celtic soul, since Van the Man single-handedly invented the genre. This was the guy who "rocked our gypsy soul" and took us "into the mystic" at a time when no Irish people thought we even had gypsy souls, for chrissakes!

As he gets older and his voice gets deeper, he barks more like a cranky grandfather than cooing like a caravan poet. This serves the blues well, but one misses that wide-eyed romantic of yesteryear after 15 years of non-stop grizzled groans.

Just when you think you will never get that old green magic out of this old codger, he floors you with the idealistic "Lover Come Back" over a weepy slide guitar. He talks of the "sound of the evening breeze calling you back to me." His voice pleading, he hits all the right romantic notes that made him King of the Chick Flick Soundtrack to begin with.

Let's hope he gives the bar band blues music a rest on his next release in favor of more lover talk like this!

Though the music on Keep it Simple is, well, simple, Morrison should get a big round of applause for lending his limelight to other musicians from Northern Ireland.

He will be headlining a Northern Irish showcase at the influential South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas this week. The showcase will feature Downpatrick's the Answer, Armagh band In Case of Fire and Belfast's Foy Vance, Oppenheimer and Driving By Night. This will be the first time Morrison has performed at the festival, and the concert will form part of a short tour in the U.S. to promote the new album.

As well as the various concerts taking place, the Northern Ireland Music Industry Commission will host a Belfast/Nashville Sister City showcase party, featuring Foy Vance, the Answer, Brian Houston and Eilidh Patterson and a number of Nashville artists including Beth Nielsen-Chapman. NIMIC will also host a New Music From Northern Ireland showcase party, featuring the Answer, In Case of Fire, Driving By Night and Oppenheimer.

Who knows? Van might mix it up with the young-uns at the festival and might surprise us next time around. Until then, he provides a simple yet forgettable reminder of top-notch songwriting on Keep It Simple.