John Martyn • Sweet Little Mystery • Live on The Old Grey Whistle Test • 1980

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John Martyn • Sweet Little Mystery • Live on The Old Grey Whistle Test • 1980

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John Martyn’s Grace and Danger album was released 40 years ago today, 1 October 1980.

This is the superlative Whistle Test performance of Sweet Little Mystery with Phil Collins on drums and backing vocals, cleaned up and synced to an excellent quality remastered audio.

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John Martyn produced some extraordinary albums in the 1970’s. He was a mainstay of the British Folk Music scene, known for his fine song-writing, masterful acoustic guitar playing, and soulful singing. But Martyn was never a standard Folkie. Quite early in his career he began to incorporate jazz and rock, on albums such as the sublime Solid Air (1973). By the time of One World (1977) Martyn was revered for his breath-taking guitar experimentation, running acoustic guitar through a series of effects, famously including the Echoplex tape delay.

John Martyn’s Grace and Danger album was released on Island Records on the 1st of October 1980. In musical terms, it was a more conventional offering than its predecessor. Regardless it was full of deeply moving songs of heartbreak and loneliness. The material had actually been recorded in the summer of 1979. However, the release of Grace and Danger was delayed for over a year by Island Records owner, Chris Blackwell. The album had been conceived during John Martyn’s painful divorce with his wife Beverly, and Blackwell who was a friend of both, found the album too depressing too release.

Phil Collins, contributed drums and backing vocals to the album. Collins often gets a bad rap, criticized for making bland and smug pop hits that were omnipresent in the 80’s. However, in the mid to late 70’s his drumming was quite brilliant. Collins was a workaholic; as well as playing in his art/prog rock outfit Genesis, he was also part of jazz rock outfit Brand X. In addition, he was an in demand session drummer, contributing to some amazing albums including Brian Eno’s early albums - Taking Tiger Mountain, Before and After Science and Another Green World. He also played on Robert Fripp’s 1977 Exposure album and on Peter Gabriel’s influential III album in 1980; on the latter creating the ground breaking gated reverb drum sound.

John Martyn and Phil Collins, forged a deep friendship during the writing and recording of Grace and Danger. Like Martyn, Collins was also going through a traumatizing divorce at the time. According to legend, Martyn would stay at Collins house, and the pair would be up all night drinking and writing and recording songs in Collins makeshift home studio. Much of Phil Collins debut album, Face Value also took its genesis (pun intended!) from these sessions, and the two albums share many similar themes.

There is evidence of Martyn and Collins ongoing kinship over the years. Collins features in the 2004 John Martyn BBC documentary “Johnny Too Bad” talking about the recording of Grace and Danger. And at the 2008 Folk Awards, Collins kisses Martyn on the forehead as he presents him with an award. Martyn was by then wheelchair bound and in bad shape, but is still cracking self-deprecating jokes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03UxXzXXvSw
John Martyn died the following year, aged 60.

Grace and Danger was finally released in October 1980, 18 months after the original recording sessions. This Whistle Test show from shortly thereafter, is the only known filmed performance of tracks from the Grace and Danger era to feature Phil Collins, and the sound on this wonderful performance is very close to that of the album.

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I have cleaned up and synced the video material to the excellent quality remastered audio of the same performance, available on the 2007 Grace and Danger Deluxe reissue.

Thanks for watching, hope you dig it!

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Credits

Audio & Video:
John Martyn • Sweet Little Mystery • Recorded live on BBC TV’s The Old Grey Whistle Test • Broadcast January 10th 1981 • Recording date likely to be late December 1980

Musicians:
John Martyn • Guitar, vocals
Phil Collins • Drums, backing vocals
Alan Thomson • Bass
Tommy Eyre • Keyboards, synthesizers
Danny Cummings • Percussion

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