Martin Turner

[uwe]

As I write I have Martin Turner three feet before me on stage, white Tbird and all, at a tiny club near Frankfurt, playing all of Argus with Martin Turner's Wishbone Ash! Upfront in the mix with an Ashdown/Hartke bi-amping rig with 15 and 2x12 cabs, emulating a docile Ric sound and spoiling me with his melodic runs ... Am I lucky or what? These days he looks a bit like a mix between Martin Sheen and John Kerry, graciously aged and his voice fine ...

[gweimer]

Martin is the reason I play Thunderbirds (or the closest thing to them).  I'm green with envy.  No Hamer this time out?   

[uwe]

Naw, just his old Bird, refinned white, I don't even see a spare ...

[doombass]

I'd love to have been there Uwe.

[TBird1958]

Wow!

By contrast I'm at work moving some light fixtures around the showroom to the tune of "It's raining in my heart" from our usually decent muzak program.............Makes me wish I had some knitting needles to put in my eardrums to ease the torture 

[MikeyB5]

Lucky you.I hope they make it to Chicago sometime.I saw the original lineup in the seventies then in the early eighties with Trevor Bolder on bass. Just like gweimer he is the reason I'm a Bird lover.

[Highlander]

Never seen him play anything but... not seen in over 20 and never saw the TT line-up...

Definitely the best I saw was in a steaming hot Marquee Club in 1977...

Anyway, shame on you for not concentrating on the show... 

[gweimer]

I saw them pretty close up on the Argus tour, with Flash opening.  They were great.  It was the first time I ever saw someone play slide guitar sideways.  Ted Turner put his Strat on what looked like an ironing board to play slide on it.

[MikeyB5]

I saw them pretty close up on the Argus tour, with Flash opening.  They were great.  It was the first time I ever saw someone play slide guitar sideways.  Ted Turner put his Strat on what looked like an ironing board to play slide on it.

I believe that is a show from the same tour that I saw.Was that in Chicago?

[clankenstein]

i saw them in wellington new zealand in 1974 at the st james theatre.they were great and i really liked the bass sound.

[Chris P.]

Martin Turner must have had a bad night: Imagine him playing his ass off, bi-amping his great old Thunderbird knowing he has influenced a lot of guys. And right in front of him is a German lawyer not listening, not paying attention but busy texting some forum with his mobile phone....

[uwe]

I had prepared the text during the break between two sets and sent it when he reappeared for the playing of the whole of Argus ...  That said, I'm sure he wondered about the guy in a suit in the front row staring at his (almost albino-white, he seems to have a pigmentation disfunction on both his arms) hands and his bass most of the time! 

A few murky/blurry/shaky shots with my Blackberry, I'm such a lousy photographer:

The rig before the gig, notice the EQ setting of the Hartke, not much bass and zilch treble and presence, that comes from the Ashdown:





Herr Turner:




Herr Turner and the new guitarist (group Benjamin and still a little hesitant "phew, glad I got that right!"):




Working the tool (a formerly sunburst sixties TB with a new headstock and partial neck grafted onto the remaining neck at pretty much the low G, you can see the hairline through the refin):




Yes, Scott, it's a Badass II - THAT PROVES NOTHING, even icons are led astray sometimes!!!




The rig after the gig:

[uwe]

Few observations:

- Except when singing, MT is a horizontal, not a vertical fretboard player, i.e. he moves from fret to fret, jumping quite a bit, when he plays those melodies of his, rather than staying in one position and moving from string to string. Most of his playing is either around the first five frets or 12 and higher, though he largely stays outside of the region where a TBird becomes uncomfortable, I only saw him play a note at the 19th fret once.

- He rests his pinky mostly underneath or on the lower edge of the treble pup and picks in the space between the two pups.

- He is not always that accurate!  To be fair, I was so close I could see and hear every little glitch.

- He plays a lot of octaves, power chords (on two or three strings) and open strings (downtunes E string to D often from song to song - someone give the man a Hipshot D-tuner!) and likes to hammer with his fist on the upper horn of the TB to let the E (or downtuned D as the case may be) ring on his bass.

- His playing is hardly ever in eights, mostly fours or less, straight or syncopated (which he does a lot), eights really only come into play when he plays his little melodies, but I did not once in the whole concert see him "throb" eights on a root note except during Living Proof.

Overall his bass playing is Chris Squire'rish upfront with a bony sound, but not as agressive and he was very loud in the mix though he plays with a lot of dynamics. He "stalks" through the music, rather than laying a foundation. A lot of melody bits which I used to think were played (overdubbed) by a guitar, are actually him playing up high with the E string ringing empty to keep the foundation. It works well.

So how do the two currently existing "Wishbone Ashes" compare? Even where the current bass player in the "other Wishbone Ash" (headed by Flying V-man Andy Powell, who is in legal strife with MT for all kinds of things) plays those Martin Turner riffs note-perfect (like the bass melody middle part in "Time Was"), it doesn't sound as upfront and "there" as Martin (even though Andy Powell's bass player - a five string Stingray finger player - has probably greater dexterity than Martin, he very much remains a backing bassist in his groove and attack). Similarly, the two guitarists MT has with him are good and replicate the twin harmony sound well, but don't have the edge Andy Powell and his current (very good) Norwegian sidekick has in the other Ash nor are they Ted Turner or Laurie Wisefield (technically the best and most versatile guitarist Ash ever had, it is no surprise that he is now making a good living as a session muso on Nokia Night of the Proms events or as the first choice guitarist in the Queen musical show in London's Westend). MT's drummer is very smooth and laid back, quite Steve Upton'ish, Andy Powell's drummer (barely a twen), in contrast, gives the music more of a kick up the butt. When Martin introduced his drummer to the audience, the latter lazily stroked his cymbals and toms a bit which had Martin cry out: "That wasn't even a drum solo ... you sound like Ginger ... Ginger Rodgers!" Martin's voice is still flexible and youthful, Andy Powell's vocals (who has adopted the lead singer role in the other Ash) strains in comparison when performing songs Martin originally sang, he's quite comfortable with the newer stuff though.

In any case, I was beaming thoughout the gig! And couldn't help find how much his playing is similar to mine though I never really analyzed his bass playing (or witness it) like I did last night.

[gweimer]

I believe that is a show from the same tour that I saw.Was that in Chicago?

Auditorium Theater, as I recall.  I miss Chicago.

[godofthunder]

 I got to see Wishbone Ash live around 72 or 73. Uwe I am so thrilled for you ! To be that close ! Did you get talk with him at all ?? Ah great minds think a like !