So long, Johnny Too Bad. John Martyn’s 1980 album Grace And Danger has accompanied several memorable spells in my life, especially the stunning ‘Sweet Little Mystery’ with a still cool Phil Collins (prior to his solo career MoR lows) playing drums and adding shimmering backing vocals. That album is a masterpiece but was almost never released. He also recorded one of the best ever cover versions of ‘Over the Rainbow’ (get the one on the hard-to-find Sapphire, rather than the live version). Martyn was recently awarded an OBE in the New Year’s honours list, so we must presume his death was expected; he died in an Irish hospital, cause TBC. He wrote one of the 20th Century’s classic folk songs, ‘May You Never’. There’s an obituary here, with the now ubiquitous YouTube link and over a hundred comments. Apart from a unique voice, he had an inimitable electric guitar style. His solos were logical and melodic; he never noodled. It’s good to see some nice obits have already been written; at the time he lost part of his leg to septicaemia a few years ago, it proved virtually impossible to verify the facts online. I smiled at his recent comment about wanting to record with jazz saxophonist Pharoah Saunders: “We’d best get on with it before one of us dies, though. He’s 74 now, and I don’t feel too well myself.”