{"id":5783,"date":"2011-02-11T00:23:30","date_gmt":"2011-02-11T04:23:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/?p=5783"},"modified":"2011-02-11T00:23:30","modified_gmt":"2011-02-11T04:23:30","slug":"mystery-date-revealed-robbie-robertson-or-was-it-bob-dylan-discovery-hirth-martinez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/mystery-date-revealed-robbie-robertson-or-was-it-bob-dylan-discovery-hirth-martinez\/","title":{"rendered":"Mystery Date Revealed: Robbie Robertson (or Was It Bob Dylan) Discovery Hirth Martinez!"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Will Your Mystery Date Be a Dream or a Dud?<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Considering that I’ve been a fan of The Band<\/strong> since my uncle turned me onto them when I was a little boy, I was surprised to learn during our Artists Who Have Dabbled in Production for Other Artists<\/a> thread that Robbie Robertson<\/strong> produced the debut album by someone named Hirth Martinez<\/a><\/strong>. I’ve tracked down a lot of Band-related albums, including that Neil Diamond<\/strong> exercise in pomposity, Beautiful Noise<\/em>, but I’d never heard of this Martinez cat. Thanks to Townsman BigSteve<\/a><\/strong>, I’m now enjoying Martinez’ first two albums, the 1975 Robertson-produced Hirth From Earth<\/a><\/em> and Big Bright Street<\/a><\/em>, a 1977 album produced by Band engineer\/arranger John Simon<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

I’m still trying to get my head around who Martinez is. What little information I find on him on the Web starts with split reports of him having been “discovered” by either Robertson or Bob Dylan<\/strong>. Most likely he existed before either of those well-know musicians threw their support behind him, but you know how this stuff goes. As I told BigSteve after my initial spins of these albums, I thought his music sounded like “Van Dyke Parks<\/strong> if he didn’t suck, or Ry Cooder<\/strong> if he had half a voice.” I later saw that Parks had played on at least one of his albums.<\/p>\n

As I said in the Mystery Date<\/em> piece, the song I chose, “Be Everything” was not as characteristic of most of the songs on Hirth From Earth<\/em>. I simply liked it and thought it had its own ephemeral feel. However, the album does have an unusual span of influences. Producer Robertson and engineer\/arranger Simon are strongly in evidence here, on “Comin’ Round the Moon.” Garth Hudson<\/strong> also plays on these albums along with a cast of top-flight session players.<\/p>\n[audio:http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/05_Comin_Round_the_Moon.mp3|titles=Hirth Martinez, “Comin’ Round the Moon”]\n

Across the two albums BigSteve turned me onto, Martinez has about as many short songs as Guided By Voices<\/strong>. From second album, here’s one that’s caught my ear, “Cold and Silver Moment”…after the jump!<\/em><\/p>\n[audio:http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/08_Cold_and_Silver_Moment.mp3|titles=Hirth Martinez, “Cold and Silver Moment”]\n

Martinez still writes, records, and performs to this day. All in all he strikes me as an interesting cat\u2014and certainly the kind of cat for whom the term “cat” would apply. Finally, here’s an audio-only video of a nice live version of a song that first appeared on his debut album.<\/p>