Sweet Honesty: The Beverley Martyn Story Paperback – Import, 7 January 2011

I only got this today and read it in one sitting. I was really taken by Beverley's story and was at times quite horrified by the abuse she has suffered. It's a survivor's story but also the story of a singer and songwriter who is talented in her own right but became suffocated by her partnership with her more famous husband. Her story pre-meeting John Martyn is fascinating, a great insight into the London folk scene in the mid-60s. I admire her candidness and also her grace and forgiveness. Despite incredible hardships, Beverley comes across as a lovely person who is not bitter - and certainly has a right to be! Maybe her musical life could have been more prolific if she had had the right manager or someone solely dedicated to her career.

No doubt that Ms. Martyn had plenty of experiences in the music business (notably due to her abusive ex-husband John), and these may draw a reader to this memoir. The book reads like the edited oral history it is, but there is no sparing the rod where her own issues (notably those of mental health) are concerned. It seems apparent that her personality made her especially susceptible to masochism and self-blame, and one is moved by the various "slings and arrows" she has encountered. She pleads a great deal, yet maintains some sense of responsibility alongside her pain, so that one retains a sense of empathy, perhaps to the point of self-identification. It is a pity that her song writing became impossible during her recovery; one is curious as to how her music would have developed in a happier personal atmosphere. (There is a CD of relatively recent vintage for those who are interested.) I'm glad that she has endured as a survivor of a variety of individual difficulties.

Not really sure what to say about this. I've known for about 30 years that John Martyn had been abusive to Beverley. It was no secret on the south coast of England, though details were scant. I suppose it's right that she puts her story across, to give a rounded portrait of John. Not sure how rounded this one is, as it concentrates primarily on his control ansd violence (verbal and physical). I'm not clear that Beverley's grasp of psychology is terrific - she seems to blame JM's violence on his being Glaswegian. Ok, there are some hardmen in Glasgow, but not the entire population! Although she laments playing second fiddle to John during rheir life together, she doesn't give a lot of evidence that her potential was wasted. Certainly, her literary skills are questionnable. The book is packed with bathos - does someone interested in John and Beverley Martyn seriously need footnotes throughout this slim volume helpfully informing them as to who such obscure figures as Bert Jansch, Sandy Denny and, er, Bob Dylan might be? 3 stars for being a primary source, and for the pain she endured, but definitely not a great work in its own right.

This isn't very long, and it's not incredibly insightful or beautifully written, but good grief, I was surprised by this story. That she could have been such a bright light and then covered over by the bushel basket of her abusive husband's insecurity! That she was there and knew so many brilliant figures on the late 60s and later scene--girlfriend to Paul Simon, actually on the Bookends record, performed at the Monterey Pop Festival, and other famous venues, was the original lead artist in the pairing with John Martyn, and so on--pals with Nick Drake and wrote with him, learned guitar from her first real boyfriend, Bert Jansch, and so on and so on. I was just amazed thinking about her life. And yet, somehow, this relatively bald statement of events doesn't really capture that history in a way that my imagination wants to supply. I look forward to her forthcoming record, and I'd like to find the one solo record she released at the beginning of the 80s--and I'm going to relisten to my copies of Road to Ruin and Stormbringer! even if I have to dig out the turntable!

Despite having made music with such notable worthies as Zep rocker Jimmy Page, folk rocker Richard Thompson and folkies Sandy Denny, Ralph McTell, Davy Graham and Bert Jansch along with others such as John Martyn, Beverley Martyn failed to hit the headlines which, assuming this would have rested easily with her, was a great shame. The above-mentioned, one-time husband, singer-songwriter John, who, whilst enjoying an ultimately well-deserved fantastic career playing his guitar-induced soundscapes and lilting love-songs, was, it says here, largely responsible for a decline and a musical hiatus of more than a decade in Beverley's career. The whole story is documented here personally with no holds barred. Be warned and have a happy book standing by with which to follow.