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Joined: November 03 2014
Location: North Yorkshire
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Points: 55 		Direct Link To This Post Topic: Martin Orford
    Posted: November 05 2014 at 23:41
Just downloaded an app for rock radio and listened to a couple of traks by the bove mentioned Martin Orfod.
 Anyone know him ?
 Didn't sound too bad...a bit MOR maybe but some clever guitar and organ work.
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Points: 13243 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 00:32
Martin Orford was the keyboardist, and a founding member, of neo-prog alumni, IQ, a great band who continue to make great music to this day.

Martin left the band, and the music industry, owing to his disgust at the way the industry was going, in particular with illegal down loaders filching music for nothing

You probably heard tracks from his swansong album, The Old Road, featuring, amongst others, John Wetton of Crimson and Asia, and David Longden, now with Big Big Train.

The Old Road is a stunning album which shows just what a huge loss to the genre Orford going is, and I thoroughly recommend it to anyone. It is not a "bit MOR". It is a "lot good".
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Points: 55 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 00:56
Ta for that Steve.
 I'll look out for more.
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Points: 26151 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 01:45
I regard both his solo albums as masterpieces. Not one weak moment. John Jowitt and Gary Chandler of Orford's other band Jadis were heavily involved on his debut Classical Music And Popular Songs (horrible clunky title but don't let that put you off) . The Old Road features Nick D'Virgillio on drums as well as Chandler. Also John Mitchell of It Bites and Frost plays on one track as do Mike Holmes and Pete Nicholls of IQ. I would recommend The Old Road slightly above the debut but both are great.
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Points: 55 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 03:23
cheers boysh .Thumbs Up
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Points: 20468 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 08:44
Originally posted by richardh richardh wrote:

I regard both his solo albums as masterpieces. Not one weak moment. John Jowitt and Gary Chandler of Orford's other band Jadis were heavily involved on his debut Classical Music And Popular Songs (horrible clunky title but don't let that put you off) . The Old Road features Nick D'Virgillio on drums as well as Chandler. Also John Mitchell of It Bites and Frost plays on one track as do Mike Holmes and Pete Nicholls of IQ. I would recommend The Old Road slightly above the debut but both are great.


 
Hmmm....I'll have to relisten to The Old Road.....the first time I heard it I was not overly impressed. Maybe I' wasn't paying attention. I really like IQ and the players on Old Road are excellent so I need to revisit it.
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Points: 5820 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 10:23
Martin Orford still performs to small gatherings occasionally, with his old Jadis bandmate Gary Chandler. There were a couple earlier this year at Paul Brewer's specially adapted residence in Chandler's Ford nr. Southampton, UK - and here's a review with some photos of the first of the two gigs on June 7th: http://giggingforever.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/7th-june-2014-gary-chandler-and-martin.html. Due to the high demand for tickets there was a second performance at the same venue on 13th September. Tickets were £25 each, so although this may have been a small and informal setting, the 'concerts' were both of very high quality indeed. I actually posted about these events back in January this year: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=96897. Smile
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Points: 67 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 11:31
Cool thread. Thanks for that blog info yam yam, it's good to know Martin is still doing the occasional gig. I'm proud to own both Martin's solo CD's and I agree with other comments here that they're really great. They are more "straight ahead" in places which might be why some people here don't groove to them quite so much, but I think they're very worthwhile albums and probably have something for everyone--they're quite diverse after all.

And of course, I can still enjoy his wonderful contributions to so many of the IQ albums.




Edited by january4mn - November 06 2014 at 22:17
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Points: 15006 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 12:25
Just spin IQ's Ever to realize what a blow prog rock sustained when Martin grabbed his coat. Then spin The Wake to drive the stake home.
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Points: 26151 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 06 2014 at 22:12
Originally posted by verslibre verslibre wrote:

Just spin IQ's Ever to realize what a blow prog rock sustained when Martin grabbed his coat. Then spin The Wake to drive the stake home.

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Points: 5093 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 07 2014 at 05:59
Originally posted by lazland lazland wrote:

 Martin left the band, and the music industry, owing to his disgust at the way the industry was going, in particular with illegal down loaders filching music for nothing.

Wasn't it also related to Martin suffering some health problem?

Great keyboardist and composer indeed.
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Points: 26151 		Direct Link To This Post Posted: November 10 2014 at 15:01
Originally posted by Gerinski Gerinski wrote:

Originally posted by lazland lazland wrote:

 Martin left the band, and the music industry, owing to his disgust at the way the industry was going, in particular with illegal down loaders filching music for nothing.

Wasn't it also related to Martin suffering some health problem?

Great keyboardist and composer indeed.

No aware of that, Could you be confusing Orford with another very talented keyboardist and composer Jem Godfrey? He had to pack it in but then last year came back with the help of his good friend John Mitchell to reform Frost*. 
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