Entertainment For Lively Minds
Last Minute Change To Cover Of WORD!
Here's the front of the next issue. We heard the sad news about John Martyn five hours before we went to press and immediately changed the cover and compiled a substantial tribute. There’s some magnificent recollections from Andy Gill, Richard Williams, David Hepworth and Rob Fitzpatrick (who conducted the last big interview, for WORD in July 2008). And some extraordinary and moving memories of the man who "lived three lifetimes" from Chris Blackwell, Danny Thompson, Danny Baker, Robin Williamson, Robert Smith, Bert Jansch, Ralph McTell, Phil Collins and many more.
The subscribers' copies will be in the post on Friday February 6 so should be with you all on Saturday (I'm afraid we were in such a rush we didn’t have time make a special cover for subscribers so all issues will look the same this month). The news-stand editions are out on Thursday 12.
Excellent
Well done all.
Heroic work chaps
I'm sure everyone here will appreciate the effort and midnight oil put in.
Good work
Brilliant
Well done everyone at Word.
Splendid
display of stop-pulling power. Appreciated.
lack of podcast
I imagine this was the reason for a lack of a podcast last week - perfectly understandable in the circumstances !
Well done ...
I am sure the massive will all be much appreciative of your efforts.Sending virtual pints of Double Diamond with large chasers of Talisker to you all,it's what the great man would have wanted.
Sterling effort!
This is exactly why I read Word Magazine.
I saw the great man at Cropredy a couple of years ago. Superb!
I find it...
...rather comforting in these 24-hour news cycle times that there are still 'stop the press' and 'hold the front page' moments.
Rather less comforting for those who worked round the clock to deliver, but I am truly grateful, etc.
JM fans
will all be delighted by this - this is a truly significant loss to music and maybe a few more people will start to appreciate what he achieved at last.
Un lavoro ben fatto, as they say here in Italy...
and as they say there in the UK, a job well done! Obviously I would rather you hadn't had the choice with regards to making these changes and that John Martyn was still with us, but the fact that you saw fit to do so says a lot about why we all love your magazine so much.
And I might just add that my local record shop here in Firenze had sold out of John Martyn CDs when I went in this morning, so his music isn't just touching people within the UK.
Music Journalism
in its truest form and at its best. I cannot wait to read it - as usual.
Excellent Effort
Looking forward to reading it, no doubt it will be a interesting read. Just been listening to John Martyn's One World tonight and it sounded even more poignant than usual. It's kind of sad how a lot of artists/ musicians aren't fully appreciated until their demise.
Sad indeed
John's albums spent a grand total of 30 (30!) weeks in the UK charts, and he only grazed the top 20 once. In the best way possible, the tributes paid to him since his death have been way out of proportion to his commercial success, and I've been utterly perplexed as to how someone so well loved & admired could just never have "clicked" at all with the record buying public...
True dedication
... that shows why you guys are still in the business a million years later. It's the love of the music that comes first, and that's why yours is the only music magazine I now buy. Thanks for the respect you're showing to a truly great artist.
Also, if anybody's interested, there's a condolence book type thing on his website www.johnmartyn.com
Very welcome
Having barely listened to anything else since his death, I can't wait to read your take on a fascinating man & his music. Congrats on a brave decision.
That took a lot of moxie.
I think that you collectively achieved more in five hours than I did in the whole of January.
I knew...
...as soon as I heard the news, that you guys would show sincere appreciation for a great musician's life and work, but to work so hard to do it is truly appreciated. Many thanks, will look forward to reading, as always.
Thank you
and well done. That's the effort that makes you lot different.
Bowing out on a high note
Rather like Roy Orbison and Rory Gallagher, in the last year of his life at least he saw a flurry of recognition starting to build - do flurries build? Well, they do now - after many years of relative oblivion.
Even RT has his detractors, but off-hand the only artist I can't remember ever seeing a bad word said about on this site is John Martyn. Stopping the presses to reflect that was the right decision (and perhaps a brave one, since it's not necessarily the safest cover to go with from a commercial point of view). Well done, Word.
Are we allowed to ask what the originally scheduled cover story was?
Okay. Thought not.
Considering
the perfect storm of publicity surrounding the release of yet another bloody album by a certain American singer, it's quite possible we'd have been treated to a certain Sr. Springsteen (probably bearded too). Know which one I prefer. Nice one, the Word.
It was 'Ginger Baker's Spent Force' + bearded photo
I think.
Well the credits box lists
Cover Photograph: Pet Shop Boys by Muir Vidler
PLEEEEEEEEASE tell me you'll keep this feature for next month's mag. My favourite group in my favourite magazine. Yay!
Podcast
Good work all round. But no podcast? Is this true? Can we be told?
Is there room for a double podcast this week instead.
Sorry, as mentioned on the blog - I'm posted out in Cameroon - so while I can get the podcast (just about) I can't get the mag.
I'm missing the weekly Dad-chat that is the podcast.
John Martyn
So glad that you are covering JM's sad passing with such gusto. Look forward to wallowing in Martyn related articles on Fri
JM
Wordmeisters , what can one say.....cheers and thank you..would be enough ...looking forward to Saturday!!
Commercial Success
Wierd isn't it - we all loved John Martyns music and could not fathom out why he was not more popular - yet if he had been I am sure we would have liked him rather less.I suppose we all like to think we have better 'taste' than the masses. Which, of course, in my case, is true.
Well done to the Word team. I brought subscriptions to both my brothers for Xmas and they were also JM fans so will all look forward to the tribute.