THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
1,735) John and Beverley Martyn — “Stormbringer!”
From John Martyn (see #1,400), “[t]he Glasgow raised Scottish/Belgian folk legend” (Graeme Thomson, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/jul/15/nick-drake-john-martyn-complex-friendship-small-hours-extract), here is a song “[v]ery much in the mold of the electric Fairport Convention of this period . . . sizzl[ing] with acoustic interplay and an almost jazzy feel”. (James Chrispell, https://www.allmusic.com/album/stormbringer%21-mw0000709927) It is off John and Beverley Martyn’s album Stormbringer!.
Ross Palmer writes:
[“Stormbringer!” is] the album’s most indelible track, on which John’s guitar takes a backseat to the piano of Paul Harris, the sessions’ musical director. . . . [It] features New York jazz player Herbie Lovelle on drums . . . . Harris’s piano owns the song. His 16-bar solo, sounding like a more pastoral Richard Wright, may be the most beautiful passage on any John Martyn record; playing this graceful and empathetic is rare in any form of music.
https://songsfromsodeep.wordpress.com/2016/10/17/stormbringer-john-beverley-martin/
As to the LP, John Martyn’s website says:
In 1969 John met and married Beverley Kutner who was signed to Joe Boyd’s Witchseason label. John was originally hired to be Beverley’s backing guitarist for recording sessions. . . . John and Beverley were inspired by The Band [see #823, 1,133, 1,162, 1,495] and the album included Levon Helm on drums. John began to experiment to find a distinctive guitar sound. “Would You Believe Me” is the stand out track which featured the introduction of the echoplex guitar technique which John pioneered . . . . “John The Baptist”/“The Ocean” was released by Island as a single in January 1970 . . . . The album was cut in the summer of 1969 under the direction of Paul Harris. Joe Boyd rented John and Beverley a house in Woodstock. John felt that the album was just a little bit ahead of it’s time, saying “…a whole lot came from that record…like people started using drum ideas and stuff, and nobody had really thought of using drums with acoustic instruments before. But it’s difficult to say that sort of thing without being conceited.” John said, “It was the year of the festival. We just lived there and worked with Paul Harris very quickly and very briefly and we just went into the studio and did it very one-off, very swift. Levon Helm and Harvey Brooks we met in Woodstock and used them, just because they were friends. It seemed obvious that they should be on it.”
https://www.soundohm.com/product/stormbringer-lp
Ross Palmer adds:
In July 1969, John Martyn was a folkie who’d put out two records on Island – London Conversations and The Tumbler – neither of which were anything remarkable in an era where Fairport Convention and Bert Jansch had already done much of their best work, redefining the forms that British folk music was capable of taking in the process . . . . Beverley Martyn (nee Kutner), meanwhile, had fronted a jug band called the Levee Breakers, and put out a single written by Randy Newman (and featuring John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page, Nicky Hopkins and Andy White), with a Cat Stevens B-side. She’d played at Monterey Pop and been invited to the Bookends sessions by Paul Simon [see #1,621] where she contributed the immortal (spoken) words “Good morning, Mr Leitch, have you had a busy day?” to “Fakin’ It”. She was, in short, more of a “name” than her new husband and probably expected no more than yeoman musical support from John when they began work on what would become Stormbringer! . . . . Somehow or other – and opinions and recollections vary – the project morphed into a duo record, with John’s songs as well as Beverley’s being recorded. In no time, by sheer force of personality and pushiness, John’s voice became the dominant one; he wrote and sang six of the album’s ten tracks, and the album, when it came out, was credited to John and Beverley Martyn. It’s hard not to feel sympathy with Beverley for having been elbowed aside by her husband in this way, and the record’s producer, Joe Boyd, probably viewed the path that the record took with some regret, too; he seems not massively enamoured with John Martyn as a person, and not terribly impressed with him as a musician – “When John started living with Beverley Kutner, I was stuck with him”, he recalled in his 2006 memoir, White Bicycles. But by any reasonable assessment, John was much the greater talent (at least at that time – we can’t know what Beverley might have been capable of later in her career had she continued with it into the seventies), and Stormbringer! is a far greater record than a Beverley Martyn solo album with a bit of John’s guitar would have been. . . . John Martyn[‘s] guitar playing I can honestly call life-changing. . . . [Y]ou can’t help but think wistfully of what Martin and Harris might have done in a longer partnership . . . .
https://songsfromsodeep.wordpress.com/2016/10/17/stormbringer-john-beverley-martin/
As to John Martyn, Brett Hartenbach writes:
With his characteristic backslap acoustic guitar playing, his effects-driven experimental journeys, and his catalog of excellent songs as well as his jazz-inflected singing style, John Martyn is an important and influential figure in both British folk and rock. Martyn started out as a folk artist with jazzy leanings that were highly unusual for the mid-’60s. He made a couple of albums with then-wife Beverley that were very much of their time before embarking on a musical journey that combined folk, blues, jazz, and rock, with a tendency towards electronic and atmospheric experimentation. His early-’70s albums . . . are as distinctive and striking as anything in the singer/ songwriter canon. Alcohol problems and commercial concerns found him adopting a slicker, more pop-oriented sound as he moved toward the ’80s, but Martyn came out on top again both personally and artistically with his ’90s releases and performances. . . . He began his innovative and expansive career at the age of 17 with a style influenced by American blues artists such as Robert Johnson and Skip James, the traditional music of his homeland, and the eclectic folk of Davey Graham . . . . With the aid of his mentor, traditional singer Hamish Imlach, Martyn began to make a name for himself and eventually moved to London, where he became a fixture at Cousins, the center for the local folk scene . . . . Soon after, he caught the attention of Island Records founder Chris Blackwell, who made him the first white solo act to join the roster of his reggae-based label. . . . His voice . . . started to take on a jazzier quality as he began to experiment musically. While on the road, Martyn continued to experiment with his sound, adding various effects to his electrified acoustic. One such effect, the Echoplex, allowed him to play off of the tape loops of his own guitar, enveloping himself in his own playing while continuing to play leads over the swelling sound. This would become an integral part of his recordings and stage performances in the coming years. He also met Beverley Kutner . . . who later became his wife and musical partner. The duo released two records in 1970 . . . . The next couple of years saw Martyn continuing to expand on his unique blend of folk music, drawing on folk, blues, rock, and jazz as well as music from the Middle East, South America, and Jamaica. His voice continued to transform with each album while his playing became more aggressive, yet without losing its gentler side. . . .
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/john-martyn-mn0000196969#biography
Pay to Play! The Off the Charts Spotify Playlist! + Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock Merchandise
Please consider helping to support my website/blog by contributing $6 a month for access to the Off the Charts Spotify Playlist. Using a term familiar to denizens of Capitol Hill, you pay to play! (“relating to or denoting an unethical or illicit arrangement in which payment is made by those who want certain privileges or advantages in such arenas as business, politics, sports, and entertainment” — dictionary.com).
The playlist includes all the “greatest songs of the 1960’s that no one has ever heard” that are available on Spotify — now over 1,100 songs. The playlist will expand each time I feature an available song.
All new subscribers will receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock magnet. New subscribers who sign up for a year will also receive a Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock t-shirt or baseball cap. See pictures on the Pay to Play page.
When subscribing, please send me an e-mail (GMFtma1@gmail.com) or a comment on this site letting me know an e-mail address/phone number/Facebook address, etc. to which I can send instructions on accessing the playlist and a physical address to which I can sent a magnet/t-shirt/baseball cap. If choosing a t-shirt, please let me know the gender and size you prefer.
Just click on the first blue block for a month to month subscription or the second blue block for a yearly subscription.
Brace for the Obscure (60s rock)! / Off the Charts: 60s Rock Revelations😊 