Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Concentration and a singular vision of focus is often the key to strength in delivering purpose, few in today’s bright lights and multitude of distractions can go a certain length of time without the desire to be pulled away, to glimpse what is outside of the bubble they wish to dedicate a sense of commitment to in which to achieve greatness or at least a weight of fulfilment with honour.
Diversion and interference have gotten the better of us, scrolling past videos in search of a dopamine high, in the pursuit of a belief we are filling our time trying to make ourselves happy; and completely missing the point of existence, it is to be our best selves, to conquer mountains, literal or metaphorical, and concentrate the mind into soothing other’s hearts and keeping Troubled Horses from running wild.
A five day period in which wit, serious contemplation, undeniable examination and a studio filled with the sound of a voice, a guitar, and a harmonica, and in absolute application of the soul to the creation at hand, the soul of Martyn Joseph is once more released to bring harmony and empathy to those who have spent time in the joy and presence of his music and performances.
It is the weight of time that perhaps befuddles many, the purpose of life alluding them so that five days of intensity can feel like a life time, one devoid of contact with a friend, a loved one, always requiring a contact, and never realising a truth that by denying certain moments for a short while can lead to a greater and more enlightening kind of spiritual awakening, one where you get to know yourself, where your life is revealed to be more than a plaything of the obscurity.
Across Troubled Horses Martyn Joseph has created the urge to see attentiveness as a virtue to your own settled thoughts, to go beyond the simpleness of the day crowded with intense diversion, and single out time as an aid, not as a beast to conquer, but as a devoted friend who wants you to stop burdening yourself with unmotivated pleasures.
In songs such as the openers Let Me Hear Your Voice, My Song And My Psalm, through sheer direct emphasis in Last Night I Heard America, Getting Older, and In A World That Breaks Your Heart, Martyn Joseph’s incredible insight to sentiment, to powerful emotional direction, and the wit of a man blessed by the awareness of suffering on others, Time becomes not only a friend but a driver, an energy of the now and fighter against the urge of lethargy’s relentless charisma.
To the musicians, the artists, the poets and manifestations of industry of the soul, the humility it takes to be constant is overwhelming, the only thing we can do as fans is to applaud as they become short term hermits as they imagine a world where Troubled Horses and humans alike are found calmed and inspired.
Ian D. Hall