Published this week by Omnibus Press, Small Hours: The Long Night of John Martyn by Graeme Thomson is an intimate and unflinching biography of one of the great maverick artists. As well as the author’s own meetings with Martyn, the book draws on almost 100 new interviews with his family, old friends and close collaborators including Richard Thompson, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, Joe Boyd, Chris Blackwell, Ralph McTell and Linda Thompson. The book has already received glowing reviews in the Observer, MOJO, Independent, Irish Times, Uncut, Herald and Shindig!
To mark the publication, Folk Radio UK is hosting specially commissioned videos of five artists performing John Martyn songs, each one accompanied by a short related extract from the book.
Over the next four days, we’ll be showing exclusive performances by Karine Polwart, Findlay Napier, Siobhan Wilson and Olivia Chaney. Kicking off proceedings is Ross Wilson from Blue Rose Code, accompanied by a string quartet comprising Seonaid Aitken (first violin), Kristan Harvey (second violin), Sarah Leonard (viola) and David Munn (cello), performing Fine Lines, the opening track on Martyn’s 1973 album, Inside Out.
Credit: Garry Boyle (audio); Graham Coe (visuals)
From Small Hours:
An album that frequently cuts loose from the moorings of conventional songwriting drops a significant clue regarding its intentions in the opening seconds. Martyn comments that whichever sounds the musicians had been creating prior to the listener’s arrival had felt ‘natural’, before sliding sleepily into the opening track: Fine Lines. From the start, we are alerted to the fact that what we’re hearing is merely an excerpt, edited highlights of a larger whole.
Inside Out is often guided by surf and stars rather than map and compass, yet there are wonderful songs, too. Fine Lines is one of Martyn’s very best, as tender a song of friendship as May You Never, except that here the love extends beyond a brother to a brotherhood of the ‘finest folk in town’. It reeks of woozy late-night gatherings, the 5 a.m. pre-dawn reckoning when the music settles to a faint pulse, the bright edge of the chemicals begin to soften and blur the senses, and the awareness of a universal human bond is a matter of peaceful certitude.
Fine Lines cuts deeper than the drunken arm slung around the shoulder, travelling through skin and bone to the soul, via the deeply felt connections forged in smoke-filled rooms and over smeared glasses, in the warm communion of bodies slumped platonically on sofas. Loneliness is there, too, whispering at the window, the exquisite sadness that comes from knowing that good times are ending even as they are happening. The fragility is so profound one can hear the air shake around the strings, feel the cadences of all those empty spaces.
Small Hours is published on Thursday, 9 July 2020 by Omnibus Press.
Pre-order Small Hours – Hardback: Amazon | Kindle: Amazon
Read and watch all book extracts and performances here.
Photo Credit: Zoe Barrie