Martin Carthy - Martin Carthy

TOPIC

£21.58

Format: LP
Catalogue No.: TTSLP005
Barcode: 714822940054
Release Date: 23 Feb 2024
Genre: Folk

This vinyl re-pressing is released to commemorate Topic's 85th anniversary in 2024. Limited edition of 1000 copies. Black vinyl, standard weigh with black, polylined inner sleeves.

Re-pressing of Martin Carthy's debut album, originally released on Fontana in 1965 and re-issued by Topic in 1977.

Last vinyl re-press was on Topic for RSD in 2015. This version released to commemorate Topic's 85th anniversary in 2024.

In the early 1960s, the approach Martin Carthy took to folk music was nothing short of revolutionary, albeit a relatively quiet revolution befitting of his humble nature.

You wouldn't find Carthy's music clambering up the singles charts; his was not a face adorning the teen magazines.\r\nInstead, his influence was felt at a grass-roots level. He plied his trade in the folk clubs, which is where the likes of Bob Dylan and Paul Simon sought him out, enamoured of his traditional repertoire and keen to learn songs like 'Scarborough Fair' and 'Lord Franklin' directly from him before adapting them for their own purposes.

His debut eponymous album, re-released here, on vinyl by Topic Records as part of their ongoing Topic Treasures series, is a snapshot of the work he was doing at the time.

Originally finding its way into the world in 1965, courtesy of Fontana Records, Martin Carthy pulled together 14 songs from his burgeoning repertoire. Produced by Terry at the Philips Recording Studios in Marble Arch, the album was a must-learn checklist for budding guitarists and folk club\r\norgas, and, to this day, remains an essential listen for anyone attempting to find their way into traditional English folk music. Most people turn up for 'Scarborough Fair', very few leave without getting hooked on 'High Germany', 'Sovay' and 'Ye Mariners All'.

The album also introduces Carthy's earliest collaborations with Dave Swarbrick, an enduring and much-copied partnership that lasted, off and on, until Swarbs death in 2016, and became a blueprint for how guitar and fiddle duos ought to sound. While Carthy had been building up his solo repertoire over the previous five or six years, several of the duo arrangements on this album ('Lovely Joan', 'A Begging I Will Go', 'Broomfield Hill') were thrown together in the studio, adding a fizz and freshness to the recordings. This became the pair's standard way of working. \"We used to rehearse on stage, in front of the audience,\" he explains today.

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In the years since, Martin Carthy has become the veteran of over 40 studio albums and a veritable beacon for musicians and music lovers seeking "the real stuff." Pressed to name his favourite, he needs no time to think it over. "I always stand by the first album," he says of his 1965 debut. "I love it. There are some things on it I think I couldn't have done better. There was a clarity of purpose."

And, with this re-release, we can be sure that newcomers get to hear that sense of purpose in the best possible quality, as clearly as Bob Dylan, Paul Simon and a generation of folk lovers did six decades ago.

Carthy is currently out a well-publicised tour, covered in November's Mojo magazine. He was interviewed about his top 20 favourite albums in The Quietus (also November). There'll be a big interview with Carthy in the January issue of Uncut magazine and a track from his debut album on their Topic anniversary covermount CD.

Tour dates :

Martin Carthy - solo

08/12/2023 Global Fusion, Mycenae House, Greenwich

21/01/2024 Les Cousins @ The Moth Club

09/02/2024 Kalamazoo Club, London

10/02/2024 Hyde Tavern, Winchester

17/02/2024 Arnside Sailing Club

27/04/2024 Old Cinema Launderette, Durham

17/05/2024 Barnoldswick Music & Arts Club

23/05/2024 Seamus Heaney HomePlace, Bellaghy, NI Martin Carthy & Jon Wilks: Remember Me To One Who Lives There 02/12/2023 Borough Theatre, Abergavenny

03/12/2023 The Welfare, Ystradynglais

09/12/2023 Wiltshire Music Centre, Bradford on Avon

10/12/2023 Kings Place London

12/12/2023 Live at Sam's Sheffield + (online) Live To Your Living Room

26/01/2024 United Reformed Church, Kenilworth

27/01/2024 The Cut, Halesworth Martin & Eliza Carthy

15/03/2024 Rhos Y Gilwen

16/03/2024 - 17/03/2024 Laugharne Festival

Tracks: High Germany / The Trees They Do Grow High / Sovay / Ye Mariners All / The Queen Of Hearts / Broomfield Hill / Springfield Mine Disaster / Scarborough Fair / Lovely Joan / The Barley And The Rye / The Wind That Shakes The Barley / The Two Magicians / The Handsome Cabin Boy / And A Begging I Will Go