Beside You

"Beside You" is the second track on Astral Weeks, the 1968 album by Northern Irish singer-songwriter Van Morrison and released by Warner Bros. Records. Recording and composition The song was recorded during the first Astral Weeks recording session at Century Sound Studios in New York City on 25 September 1968 with Lewis Merenstein as producer. Van Morrison remarked on this song: "'Beside You' is the kind of song that you'd sing to a kid or somebody you love. It's basically a love song, just a song about being spiritually beside somebody." The child that would have inspired the song was his adopted son by Janet, his wife at that time. It is sung with a "hushed wonder" and in it the singer transfers the visions of his own childhood to his son. Jack Lynch wrote in 1983: