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Welcome to Martin Berry’s music. Martin Berry has been active on the Birmingham music scene for many years as a performer, singer and composer. Over the years Martin has been a member of acoustic, psychedelic, rock, ska, pop, reggae, jazz-rock, funk, dance, Bhangra crossover, and just plain strange bands! His catholic taste in music is reflected on his solo album ‘Celebrity’. The music on this site documents his labours over recent months, it includes much new material alongside major rewrites of favourite earlier songs. Probably best remembered (by those old enough!) as the bass player of Slender Loris, Martin has been writing songs and performing in bands since his sixth form days in the 60s.Martin’s first band was Bliss, formed in 1967 when Martin, Roger Hurn and Andy Pegg attended St Albans Boys Grammar School (birthplace of the legendary Zombies). From the outset they wrote their own material, with Roger providing the lyrics and Martin and Andy the music. For further information see their My Space Music site at: http://www.myspace.com/pneumaticblissIn 1969 they signed with Chapter One Records (a subsidiary of Decca) and released a single, with ‘Lifetime’ as the A-side and ‘Courtyards of Castile’ as the B-Side. Other musicians on these recordings included: Harold McNair on flute, Martin’s brother, Nick South, on electric bass, and the string section of the London Symphony Orchestra. This record bubbled under the charts in the UK - but was a big hit in Turkey! It is now a collectors’ item. Reviewed by Chris Welch in The Melody Maker he wrote “The singer sounds like Donovan with a severe head cold†Ouch … the singer was Martin!At Keele University he co-wrote and performed the music in a bizarre experimental piece of theatre called ‘The Marshall McCluhan Food Show’ which received several plaudits at the National theatre festival held in Bradford.In the 70s Martin co-formed Slender Loris with Andy Morton and Phil Kirwan. They wrote highly original contemporary acoustic music and regularly performed at the legendary ‘Big Ears’ club upstairs at The Fighting Cocks in Moseley, Birmingham. The band later expanded and ‘went electric’ with the addition of brilliant musicians Micky Barker (drums) and Dave Bristow (keyboards). Their eclectic music developed a large fan base in Birmingham and Nottingham. Sadly they suffered the usual fate of the ‘cult band’. For the Loris story visit their website at: http://www.slenderloris.com/After the break-up of Slender Loris Martin played bass or rhythm guitar in a variety of bands, most notably The Wide Boys, in the 80s, proved a popular college band and were part of the Ska/Two Tone scene.In the 90s Martin collaborated with Andy Morton again in the production of a series of ground-breaking musicals both independently and as part of the Carlton Television workshop. Particular successes were ‘Love and Spare Parts’ and ‘Utopia and Beyond’ which ran to full houses at the Mac. They also collaborated on ‘Two Gents’, Carlton Television Workshop’s 60s version of ‘Two Gentlemen of Verona’, which was performed at the Edinburgh Festival and won a Fringe Award.
