One of the major players in the Victoria busking scene, is guitarist/singer Marty Field. With 17 years experience as a street musician under his belt, he has become a familiar face playing outside of Murchies on Government Street and down on the inner harbour causeway. For the most part, Marty is a one-man-act, but back in the late ‘90s and early ‘00s, he also played in various combinations with Leigh Grisewood (bass), Caleb Kelly (fiddle) and Julian Vitek (violin). In more recent years he has been regularly teaming up with longtime busker Dave Harris, and occasionally Marty and Dave have also rocked the causeway with the guitar slingin’ son of one of Marty’s friends, in the causeway supergroup Jake Quake & The Seismatics. Whatever the musical permutations, the sound remains pretty much the same, as rock ‘n’ roll is definitely a dominant part of Marty’s DNA. When asked to describe his musical style, Marty said “I think I’m pretty much a rock and roll player, leaning somewhat towards a folky, kind of hick sound, but, certainly, I love rock and roll, and that’s mostly what I play, old ‘50s stuff, Buddy Holly, Elvis, Eddie Cochrane, [and] into the ‘60s with the Stones and Dylan, and the Beatles.”
Originally from London, ON, Marty lived in Victoria for a couple of years when he was a kid in the early 1980s, before moving back to Ontario.
He first picked up the guitar when he was about 13. “I started plucking around with some chords [that] a friend of my mother’s taught me”, he said. “I’ve always loved music so, it seemed like a natural thing for me to do then.”
The first time Marty played guitar on the street was in his hometown of London in the late 1980s. “I played a few times, sort of cut my teeth back in London." he said. "There was a guy that used to busk there, an older guy. I’ll never forget this guy. His name was Robert James, I thought it was a really cool blues name, and I used to stop and listen to him play. Every once in a while he would have to go for a Coca-Cola or something, [and] he’d say ‘Would you watch my guitar?’ I’d ask if I could play it, and he’d say ‘Yeah, go ahead.’ He’d come back and say ‘Keep playing,’ ‘cause I was kind of making him money. So I’d play his guitar and I ended up playing a few tunes and it was like a bug, you know.”
It wasn’t until he returned to Victoria in 1994, that Marty decided to launch himself into a full time busking venture. “When I came out here, I was in desperate need of money [and] I couldn’t find a job. I saw quite a few people busking in town, and I thought to myself, ‘I could try that’. I was never really much of a singer, but I just sucked it up, and the first couple of times I tried it, and I made enough to sustain myself and my girlfriend, at the time. [That was] the first time I really did it full time, or seriously, as a job, [in] ’94 during the Commonwealth Games.”
If you were to catch Marty’s sets often enough, you would soon come to know him for his many Bruce Springsteen covers. I think it might have been former local street musician Jim Meighen who coined the nickname ‘Encyclopedia Brucetannica’ for Marty, who some believed could probably perform Springsteen’s entire catalog.
I asked Marty if he could in fact play every one of Bruce’s songs, and he responded with a laugh and said “No, contrary to popular belief, I do not know every single Bruce Springsteen song. There’s a few that I don’t play, but I could certainly play a song from every album.”
On why he likes Bruce Springsteen:
“I’m a big Springsteen fan. I’ve been to a number of his shows, and I always heard that once you saw his show, you were a Bruce fan for life, and it’s true. I saw my first show, [when] I was 13 going on 14, and it was a three and a half hour show, and it just changed my whole outlook on rock and roll. I’ve seen him in Toronto, twice in ’84 and ’85, during the Born In The USA tour. and then I’ve seen, I think four shows in Vancouver including a couple of his solo acoustic shows. I’m very moved by his music, and I really get into his lyrics, [they] really speak to me, so whether he’s doing a rock song or a folk song or a country song, he’s just a great writer, [who’s] in tune with the human spirit. I think he’s got his finger on the human condition, and he speaks to me, that way.”
I asked him what his favorite song was, I was pretty sure it would be a Springsteen song, and I was not surprised when he answered, “The River, yeah, it’s just a beautifully written song, and it’s actually one of the songs that people request from me.”
Marty has also done a bit of songwriting of his own. “Yeah, I’ve got some of my own material, I don’t really play it a lot because, well, those aren’t the money making songs. People want to hear what they know, but if someone asks me to play one of my songs, sure.”
Most enjoyable thing about busking:
“I guess the thing I enjoy most about busking is interacting with the different people. The thing that brings me most joy when I’m playing is to have little kids dancing. There’s no better praise than that, to have a little kid dancing to a song I’m playing. That makes me happy, and that’s what I enjoy most about it. And the money’s okay too.”
Most memorable busking experience:
“There’s been so many, but I guess the most memorable ones are playing with other musicians. Do you remember Leigh [Grisewood]? I used to play with Leigh, big double bass. I miss those times, man. He was great to play with, he was so fun and energetic.”
Strangest thing anybody ever threw in case:
“There’s lots of strange things, I think I told you before, a nun gave me a lunch one time. People think you want food or something when you’re busking. I’ve gotten marijuana and condoms and little notes. Sometimes girls write little notes or little poems, drawings, other people’s drawings. Lint, a lot of lint from the pockets of the masses. And of course we get a lot of international monetary coins, but I always think the weirdest thing is food.”
Advice to anyone who might be considering trying busking:
“Some very talented people will try busking for the first time and they’re not used to playing in front of others. Something I always say is ‘sing it like no one’s listening’. You really just gotta get over your nervousness, or whatever’s holding you back, and play like no one’s listening.”
Check out the check out the following videos to see Marty in action:
Marty with Dave Harris
Jake Quake & The Seismatics
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