Meet Martin Newell

Martin Newell is a British singer/songwriter/poet/gardener -- a brilliant and unjustly obscure talent that ranks right up there with quintessentially British peers Robyn Hitchcock and XTC. He's a uniquely colorful character, and this, in a nutshell, is his story.

Martin spent the majority of the '80s sailing the seas of underground pop music with his band The Cleaners From Venus. He began as a pioneer of home-recording with a pop music obsession -- he made his records at home, you could send him a blank tape in the mail and he'd dub his songs onto it for you (and yes Virginia, home-recording did exist before Guided By Voices and Jack Logan). His prolific and remarkably accessible output was getting great notices, and over time The Cleaners grew up into a full-fledged band that toured and made professional records and the whole bit. At the height of the band's Euro-popularity they had an album out on RCA in Germany and were receiving offers from the hip U.S. labels of the day. That's when Martin decided he'd had enough of the music biz hassle and quit the band, taking Nelson the bass player with him. The Cleaners were finally making big budget recordings, but Martin thought they sounded like crap and said he could do better at home.

And that's exactly what they did. Martin and Nelson christened their new band The Brotherhood of Lizards and recorded the Lizardland album with a budget of 23 pounds. The result is a rich and deeply satisfying collection of pop songs -- eccentric, literate and full of character, just like the man himself. First released in England on longtime pal and sometimes songwriting partner Captain Sensible's now-defunct Deltic label, we have remastered and repackaged Lizardland for U.S. release, and even added a couple of exclusive bonus tracks ("Carmosine" & "Hey, Hey, Hey, We're The Brotherhood of Lizards"). Consult the disc's liner notes for Martin's own telling of the Lizards' tale -- including their tour by bicycle.

Eventually New Model Army needed a bass player and hired Nelson away from The Brotherhood of Lizards. Martin continued on though, and his first solo album, The Greatest Living Englishman (produced by XTC's Andy Partridge) came out last year to wideapread acclaim. In 1996, Martin released The Off White Album on Humbug Records in England. Having never had a U.S. label before, Martin's material is only now starting to be discovered here, but at long last, American audiences are finally starting to get to know the genius they've had in their midst all along. In the meantime you'll find Martin Newell in the remote fishing village of Wivenhoe, England, tending to his garden and writing more great songs. Or maybe you'll find him down at the pub.

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