S*T*U*F*F* Reloaded

I heard the news on Radio 4 that John Martyn died today, aged 60.

I’m sure tributes will be flying around all over the place… well-deserved for the most part. What an incredible musician and songwriter…

I was lucky enough to get to play on stage with him one night. Juliet Turner had been supporting him for three nights in the Temple Bar Music Centre in Dublin, and I was in her band. On the last night, John decided to wander back up on to the stage and do a few tunes, and I was asked to play bass - for some amazing old-school JM tunes - Solid Air, Over the Hill. I will never forget the intense gaze - whether deeply alcohol-fuelled or not, it reached for a thousand miles in pure darkness - as I played music with the man.

During the USA Fleadh season of 1999, I was touring the USA with Eleanor McEvoy, a wonderfully lovely Irish singer-songwriter from Dublin. Every week, our dressing room tent was sandwiched between Beth Orton and John Martyn. Niall Toner (the guitarist on that tour) and myself used to wander up and watch John’s gigs in sheer amazement - one man with his Les Paul gold top, swaying in the evening breeze, cool as anything, playing this phenomenal music. In San Francisco, he helped us out by opening bottles of beer with his teeth when we found there was no opener… a well-known party trick of his, I’m sure, but a novelty for the likes of me.

As I was picking Luka up from nursery tonight, just after I heard the news, I got out of the car, to see the most beautiful crescent moon and one bright star in the sky. It just seemed to sum up everything I was feeling… this guy is dead and once more, the beauty of life and all its transience, its fragility, seems more than I can bear.

As John sings at the end of a song called “Father Time” on the Cooltide album, “I won’t go ’til I’m ready and you won’t catch me I won’t go ’til I’m ready…” Guess he was ready.