Description
About the artist: The funniest man in folk, Martin has the ability to point out the absurd in everyday situations, and to bring the pompous down to earth.
CD Review by Greg Barnett
In all honesty, I’m quite ignorant of the current folk scene, so I had to Google Martin Pearson … and, even then, there were precious few references to him and his output.
Apparently, he performs at every major folk music festival and folk venue in the country and he can fill the largest venues of the National Folk Festival.
Not young enough to be up-and-coming and not quite old enough to be a legend, he describes himself as a folk-singer out of sheer bloody-mindedness, and will crash-tackle anyone who describes him as eclectic.
The most common epithet I found was that of ‘comedian/satirist’, and yet the first two tracks on this album were stunningly reminiscent of classic Ralph McTell, gorgeous guitar playing, rich velvet voice, and melodies/lyrics that can rip at your heart.
Arrangements are tasteful and varied, but always musical.
There are eleven contributors covering additional vocals, guitars, bass, accordion, fiddle and percussion.
Tracks 3, 5, 8, 9, 13 are live comedy bits which, in my opinion, would sit better in a comedy-specific album.
Their change of atmosphere and mediocre recording quality is quite jarring and each time pulled me out of the contemplative and appreciative mood that the seriousness, melancholic and well-arranged/recorded songs had created.
The CD sleeve unfortunately does not provide any writers’ credits, although Track 14 is a quality cover of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”.
14 tracks and 61:06 playing time. Jewel case. 4-pp cover with statement, tracks list and credits.
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