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NOTE: All my 'Bio-Writings', 'Song-Samples', 'Photos' and 'Images' contained in this Site are strictly Copyright 1952-2008 by Martin Eden. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.
---Singer-SongWriter-Musician---
"To be nobody-but-yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else - means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting."
- E. E. Cummings
"Normal is getting dressed in clothes that you buy for work and driving through traffic in a car that you are still paying for - in order to get to the job you need to pay for the clothes and the car, and the house you leave vacant all day so you can afford to live in it."
- Ellen DeGeneres
"Music is the shorthand of emotion."
- Leo Tolstoy
My Music:
"I'm a keen observer of self and others and the world around me, and my Lyrics and Poetry-Prose are often gestated in my subconscious mind where my connectivity 'with it all' happens.
The Music itself is my emotive twin brother, and as far as I can tell is a 'Country/Folk/Experimental Blues with a hard edge (i.e. Rock)' blend. Oh ... and I'd like to think there's a hint of Louis 'Jazz' in there somewhere too."
- Martin Eden
BIO:
~ Early Background ~
"My earliest recollection of Music is that of the sounds of Louis Armstrong and Glen Miller in the familial household somewhere between the ages of two and three. At four or five I was taken by my parents to a Louis Armstrong Concert on account of no babysitter. I sat on the armrest between them patting my forehead with my hankie while singing in my own way along with Louis. It caused a stir for my new-Australian parents, but it was a positive one!
I listened and watched with keen interest to my father play his old traditional Polish songs on his Violin at irregular intervals whereupon from the age of ten I had about eighteen months of father-sponsored, foundational, Violin Lessons before, under the strong influence of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, covertly organizing my mother to buy me my first Guitar for my twelfth birthday behind his back. There were therefore just ten mother-sponsored Guitar Lessons with a Folk Guitar Teacher located conveniently just around the corner.
Nevertheless, the Guitar has been my instrument of musical-emotive expression ever since. Moreover, I wrote my first Poem-Prose around the same age, and my first song at sixteen for my girlfriend at the time."
- Martin Eden
~ Brian ~
"Almost in quick succession I wrote my second song, again passion-driven but for a different reason. Brian Jones, my idol and founder of 'The Greatest Rock 'N' Roll Band in the World ... The Rolling Stones!' was dead!!"
It was 1969 and I was still sixteen. We had had a spate of famous people dying prematurely ... John F Kennedy ... Martin Luther King ... Robert F Kennedy ..., but this death on top was just about more than I could take. The spooky thing was that I and my good friend John had been wrestling around in my bedroom earlier that day and John threw something at me and I ducked and it hit my large Brian Jones poster cutting it across his face; I over-reacted, or at least John told me so, repeatedly saying that something serious had happened to Brian Jones! That night's news reports announced his death. John came round later asking me how I knew.
The way I handled it was to make a small album-book to commemorate his life and I included photos, a drawing, a newspaper clipping, a very brief bio, and a song I wrote entitled 'Brian Jones'. I still have it to this day."
- Martin Eden
~ Ethic ~
"One thing led to another and a Band began to take form from among friends living in the same Street. There were four: Martin, John Mick and Dave. However, Mick was left out and the remaining three went on to form the Band named Ethic.
We improvised initially on two guitars and some tins for drums with Dave taking the singing role. I wrote my third song, entitled 'There Always Seems To be Something Worth While', and we recorded it on a portable tape player and played it on that same player to many a captive audience.
Subsequently we bought 'real' instruments and began rehearsals in the front room of John's family home, much to the neighbours chagrin. However our friends were very supportive and our rehearsals seemed to draw girls from everywhere.
I took to my new role as Bass Player enthusiastically, and was very fond of my egg-shaped (like one of Brian Jones's guitars) Maton Bass and big Lancer 100 Watt Amplifier.
Simultaneously, a year out at work saw me have a close at-work encounter with the Masters Apprentices on their way to England and mixing with several 'budding musician' workmates, one of whom introduced me to the music of one Johnny Winter.
Nevertheless, apart from several near aimless rehearsals at John's place, a couple more focused ones coached by John's father, a Spanish Guitarist with Jazz Band experience, a rehearsal or two at the local Church Hall, and a couple of joint lessons on Lead/Rhythm Guitar and Bass for John and I, the Band dissolved into the practicalities of making a living and advancing that with continuing study.
There was a flurry of rejuvenated Band activity around the time of the Rolling Stones tour of early 1973, where we all went to both the afternoon and evening concerts held on the same day, but that was it."
- Martin Eden
TO BE CONTINUED...
