Solid Air Deluxe Edition - Universal Island 531 793-3
This deluxe reissue was already in the pipeline as part of Island's 50th anniversary celebrations before Martyn's sad death earlier this year
This deluxe reissue was already in the pipeline as part of Island's 50th anniversary celebrations before Martyn's sad death earlier this year
John Martyn, May You Never: The Very Best of... (Island)
As posthumous best ofs go, this is as tidy as one could wish, despite the odd regrettable omission. It favours the Irascible One's songwriting over his musicianliness and, being Island, concentrates on his Seventies peak. And so we suffer again the tenderness of Head And Heart and Sweet Little Mystery and flow with Solid Air. If you have ever experienced the midnight blues and not had a Martyn album to hand, then here's where you start. Buy this and Inside Out and you are well equipped.
Nick Coleman
Martyn never had a bona fide hit album in his lifetime, but with a fair wind, this might be the first.
John Martyn, who died last week, was impossible to categorise.
****
UNIVERSAL/ ISLAND
Compiled with due devotion, a 4-CD box set of faves, unearthed lives and outtakes.
A national treasure whose importance and influence has never been reflected in sales, Martyn's exhaustive back catalogue is brimful of genuinely pioneering approaches to folk and jazz.
Whatever there was in the water at Cousins -heart of 60s London's folk music happenings- it was potent stuff that helped spawn a scene.
Quarant'anni di canzoni, cinque ore di musica
Reviewed by Nick Coleman
Four discs, two live, two studio, the latter comprising 34 songs, a dozen of which are unreleased – a decent enough way to reflect on an extraordinary career on the eve of the artist's 60th birthday.