Has there been a thread about John Martyn?

there is probably a thread for that

thread for not liking sugar lump

i learned last night that my friend's dad, an older musician, knew martyn, anne briggs and bert jansch o_O

Glorious Fool still sounds wispy.

― the Rain Man of nationalism. (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 9 June 2017

Is this the first John Martyn album you've tried? Its an odd choice.

I mostly love 'Bless the Weather', it was the first JM album that clicked with me but, yeah, "Sugar Lump" and the artwork are not so great.

I sympathise with Alfred. On paper, Martyn is exactly my sort of thing, but he just hasn't clicked with me. I own Solid Air and Stormbringer

xxpost Jon, please grill your friend's father (for info, not for lunch)! Haven't really followed him, but agree that Solid Air and One World should convert the infidels if anything will. Also maybe Road To Ruin, with aforementioned wife Beverly---who also sounds good on John Renbourn's early 60s gypsy stash, Attic Tapes, finally out a couple years ago, and I carried on about it on the post-Fahey thread---ditto about the very recent album Renbourn's ancient colleague Wizz Jones did with fellow vet Pete Berryman and son Simeon Jones. The most specific Martyn connection I'm aware of on that 'un is a song inspired by the (or a) night Jones and and JM found themselves in deep freezing water.

the tune "give us a ring" is my favorite john & bev track. the rest are kind of dull imo! i love that song though.

i'm a pretty big fan of "John the Baptist" off of Stormbringer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE_nbrW5cMU

Is this the first John Martyn album you've tried? Its an odd choice.

― Well bissogled trotters (Michael B)

I own Inside Out and Well Kept Secret.

It's a sweet little mystery

hello! where exactly should one begin with john martyn?

I started with "Road To Ruin" then went to "One World" and then I was hooked forever. Love him.

I like Bless the Weather, Solid Air, Inside Out, Live At Leeds, One World and the solo with Echoplex Battle of Medway. That was recorded in 73 I think and put out about 10 years back.

Don't like his treatment of Beverly.

"Musically it was just dreadful. It was appalling at that point. It was dominated by real second-ratedness. All the great Sixties heroes had disintegrated into drugs or to nothing. I stopped listening to English music, except for John Martyn who would bring out a good album every year in that period." - Tony Wilson on the years before punk, quoted in John Robb's Punk Rock: An Oral History.

I'd add Grace and Danger to Stevolende's list. Sweet Little Mysteries: The Island Anthology is a good primer.

the tune "give us a ring" is my favorite john & bev track. the rest are kind of dull imo! i love that song though.

Written by Paul Wheeler for Nick Drake, iirc. It would fit quite well into Bryter Layter.

Can I just put in a word here for Oscar Jerome, who has a SE London John Martyn vibe going:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04bTf2PbMqY

Bless the Weather and Solid Air are probably the best intros but One World is his masterpiece

xp - huh! did not know that. might explain why i like that song better.

listened to One World this morning -- what a weird, brilliant record.

I swear by everything from London Conversation through One World.

Solid Air was my first record of his and I can't imagine a better introduction.

I've come to appreciate Live at Leeds (in both incarnations) and Inside Out the most out of all that stuff, but in that period I mentioned above, he put down one of the most consistent runs in recorded music, I'd reckon.

And he's clearly been hugely influential.

...on John Bonnamossa

sorry... the acoustic portion of the JB show I encountered a few years back REALLY made me think of john martyn

Who's John Bonnamossa?

My favorite Martyn performance bar none:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&persist_app=1&noapp=1&v=lE6i_qnoAgo

My favourite live performance ever I think

that guitar tone is extremely metal

love it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDMWVr9k5R8

Uncle.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYLVM560Fok

One World got me in the last week of December.

I love that Lester Bangs story about being on a music biz junket to Jamaica in the mid-70s, and while the other hacks are hanging round the pool smoking weed at the Holiday Inn, he gets a ride into Kingston -- against everyone's advice -- to go record shopping. After an hour or two he goes for a drink and is surprised to see another long-haired, bearded white guy sitting at the corner of the bar, only to find it's John Martyn.

I've prob. misremembered the details, but it just says a lot about what I love about JM; that he was from this folky background, but so hip -- for want of a better word -- to what was going on in jazz, reggae, dub, ambient etc. Not sure who/what would be the equivalent these days.

It says a lot about how he liked a bevvy too.

"small hours" (the extended mix on one other world) is where i want to live

What is One Other World? Is it the second disk of the deluxe edition?

yes. if you dig one world but haven't heard that bonus stuff, do yourself a favor

I do dig it and have the bonus disc, was wondering if there was more! I’m greedy for this beauty.

The deluxe appears to be on Spotify but I don’t see an extended mix of Small Hours, just a live version and instrumental mix:

https://open.spotify.com/album/1G8gcNHZxeRUaqHVFyCADO?si=Y9_cJHbnSOScs9gbJazY1Q

Are you referring to the latter?

I bought the 2004 double disc. I'm blasting the live disc as I type.

I don't have spotify so I can't verify the link, but I think they're talking about what you're calling the instrumental mix.

There's an instrumental version of Solid Air on one of the extended editions that is just fantastic. God bless Danny Thompson.

Solid Air is so fucking dope.

I was thumbing through some albums at a gf of my uncle's house decades ago and asked him if Solid Air was any cop and he said something really crap and not very otm like: oh he's a quite interesting nick drake protege..

I happen to have just made a mix called 'Pith & Echo,' the heart of which is "Small Hours," and which throughout focuses on music with a similar combination of total minimalism and maximum emotional impact:

https://musicophilia.files.wordpress.com/2020/02/musicophilia_00__various_-_pith-echo_1968-2019_cover-a.jpg?w=1024

https://musicophilia.files.wordpress.com/2020/02/musicophilia_00__various_-_pith-echo_1968-2019_cover-b.jpg?w=1024

https://musicophilia.wordpress.com/2020/02/23/pith-and-echo/

Sunday's Child is super underrated, if not the all-out masterpiece that One World is. Was not ready for Root Love to go so hard

that mix looks great ian!
and yeah i love sunday's child — "spencer the rover" is one of my fave Martyn moments.

I'd be interested in listening to that mix, but it would be easier for my listening set up if it was in two parts (so that the file sizes would be smaller). The same for your Elegy to Mark Hollis and your Evensong mixes.

They're streamable, too, if that helps. I had assumed file size wasn't a cobstraint for people now, so once the 100MB file size limit on Mediafire went away, I favored sound quality...

Were you aware that The Dawning now seems to be blocked for download? For me at any rate. Haven't come across any problems with any of the others so far.