Martyn Joseph

Martyn Joseph is a performer like no other. Shades of Springsteen, Knopfler and Dave Matthews there may be - but he stands in his own right, built on a reputation for giving what thousands have described as the best live music experience of their lives.



One of acoustic music’s most arresting artists, the Welsh singer songwriter has been in demand on both sides of the Atlantic for over two decades. Martyns 25 year career has embraced some notable achievements including 5 Top 50 UK chart positions, with such songs as Dolphins Make Me Cry, Working Mother and Lets Talk About it in the Morning, and appearances and tours with, amongst others, Suzanne Vega, Marc Cohn, Joan Armatrading, Runrig, Clannad, Chris de Burgh, Art Garfunkel, Jools Holland and even Celine Dion and Shirley Bassey. He has won fans everywhere with his uncanny fusion of material –feisty, pull no punches big issue numbers alongside stripped bare love songs.



Martyns particular strength is in the lyrical narrative of his songs, be they contemporary protests against injustice and inhumanity, a musical psalm to the fulfilment and fragilities of love, or a piercing précis of social history, “Its the song that can soothe, explain or even in a small way save us”. In this manner he carries on in the tradition of the six string balladeer as both catalyst and interpreter of our raddled and rewarding times, our personal and communal stories sung out loud in the spirit of Woody Guthrie, Ewan MacColl, Hank Williams and Bruce Springsteen.



Voted Best Male Artist at the 2004 BBC Welsh Music Awards and with a string of humanitarian plaudits and awards, he’s a mean guitar player with one of the most powerful voices on the circuit crafting songs with, as the BBCs Bob Harris put it, “outstanding lyrical intelligence”.



Across a 25-year career, and having released his 29th album Vegas in September 2007, Martyns song catalogue is an awesomely impressive archive of our times, our tribulations, our wonder and our wounds. One reviewer after seeing Martyn in concert likened the experience and content to “the beautiful business of being alive with all its jokes, absurdity and sadness, seared by music for the heart and head”.



Always charming, sometimes alarming, Martyn Joseph is a unique songwriter who digs deep and delivers an ultimate, life affirming message. One of the most unusual and compelling performers you are likely to encounter.



Till The End



Martyn Joseph | MySpace Music Videos

Most recent studio album - Evolved - MoJo Folk Album of the Month - March 09 - 4 stars



Rebirth of the singer songwriter tradition

The folk world has never fully embraced the Welsh singer-songwriter Martyn Joseph - perhaps never forgiving him for having a hit with a song about dolphins 15 years ago. Thats a great shame because, with a voice reminiscent of Ralph McTell, Joseph encapsulates many of folks old values with stirring songs of social issues and yes, even protest. The "The Welsh Springsteen" tag may be somewhat of a misnomer, but hes a brave and engaging live performer and this is a courageously sparse, stripped-down and entirely solo work which finds him revisiting and reinventing some of the songs that have helped bring him thus far. Among them, the prostitutes defiance in Working Mother, the miscarriage of justice resulting in the hanging of Dic Penderyn in 1831 and the bewilderment of the miners son in Please Sir are all the more dramatic when delivered with such stark bareness.



Colin Irwin - MoJo Magazine - March 2009