Thumb-nail sketch:Born in Hampstead in 1946 to accomplished parents Dr. Robert Glynn Faithfull, philologist and university lecturer, and Austro-Hungarian Baroness Erisso, a former ballet dancer, Marianne was brought up in Reading at the St. Joseph's Convent, A girl of refined sensibilities, her favourite subject was English Literature, while her hobbies included horse riding, reading - particularly poetry - cooking and listening to music, especially the works of Chopin. She acknowledged Maria Callas and Joan Baez as her most favoured exponents of singing.
She fell into the swinging sixties at an impressionable age and got a rough deal. Her mentors couldn't decide if she was to be the next Françoise Hardy or Joan Baez. In fact, with her love of the Arts, she could have settled easily into the folk scene, and participated in the many folk projects of those times such as Lark Rise to Candleford and The Transports. Alas, her liaisons with The Rolling Stones ruined her public image. She had chosen "pop" instead of "folk" and enjoyed a wild life-style for a few years. In the uncaring environment of that time, her addiction to hard drugs soon saw her friendless and penniless amongst those who should have cared for her. Read her autobiography for further details. In her 'lost years' she wrote Sister Morphine, a song that stands alongside Bert Jansch's Needle of Death as one of the great anti-drug songs. From her album Broken English onwards her talent as a lyricist has blossomed. She has always been popular, perhaps more so abroad than in Britain, and all her vinyl albums were quickly re-issued on CD format.
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T I T L E | DATE | LABEL | REFERENCE | TYPE |
| COME MY WAY | 1965 1991 |
?? DERAM |
?? 820 629-2 |
LP and | |
  
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Tracks 15-18 are not on the LP. Mostly upbeat songs with crisp guitar, arranged by Mike Leander. Fare thee
well, Lonesome Traveller and Bells Of Freedom move along
at a brisk pace with Marianne's voice spot-on key. (Because, it must be said,
some of her live performances on the BBC TV programme Top of The Pops
were only as worthy as that terrible programme deserved.) Pity we haven't
got more albums of these brisk and chirpy folk-tunes. Jabberwock and Full Fathom Five are spoken texts with experimental accompaniment - Jabberwock is particularly effective. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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T I T L E | DATE | LABEL | REFERENCE | TYPE |
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NORTH COUNTRY MAID |
? 1997 |
? Pure |
? PRCD02 |
LP and | |
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| Tracks 14-15 not on the LP. A slower album than Come My Way. Highlights are Green are Your Eyes, Cockleshells and Sally Free And Easy. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Apart from these two folk albums, Marianne recorded pop, blues, country and western (see below), punk, and "Edith Piaf ". For a complete discography see the Marianne Faithfull Site.Marianne is popular in France and Ireland and the extensive web site is French. She sings in French, thought not on the two albums above. From her early period, on Love in a Mist there is Coquillage (Cockleshells), and Ne me quite pas, whilst Plaisir d'Amour crops up on a "pop" album.
Marianne liked to include folk in her albums right up until the punk phase. Long Black Veil and Sandy Denny's Crazy Lady Blues are on Rich Kid Blues, while The Last Thing On My Mind, What Have They Done To The Rain and Greensleeves are on an earlier album.
Her voice was never better than on the song that launched her career, Come And Stay With Me and it is sad to witness the destruction of her vocal chords over the years. However, through all the mess of her recording career, she always managed to put out albums which, like them or not, always had top-quality arrangements and excellent balance from the backing musicians.
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T I T L E | DATE | LABEL | REFERENCE | TYPE |
| RICH KID BLUES | 1977 1978 1992? |
NEMS NEMS CASTLE |
NEL6007 NEL6012 CLACD148 |
LPs and | |
  
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The 24-track double-album listed above is a 1985 compilation of two vinyl
albums Dreamin' My Dreams and Faithless from 1977 and 1978.
Faithless was re-issued as a CD in the early 90s (see the § tracks).
The album cover has no notes.
Castle Communications who issued the Rich Kid Blues LPs
and the Faithless CD
give little away in the form of album notes.
(There are brief notes about MF by Michael Heatley the editor of History of Rock).
The double album did not carry I'm Not Lisa §11 from FAITHLESS or I'm Looking For Blue Eyes or Someone Loves You or Sweet Little Sixteen from DREAMIN' MY DREAMS, and it may be that these three songs have not made it to CD format. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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WHERE TO GET INFORMATION |
| You Tube | Lots of material here, but the early TV interviews are the nearest in time to the albums listed above. Marianne is about 17/18 years old I guess. |
| www.planete.net/~smironne | The massive French fan site which was full of Marianne Faithfull memorabilia, record sleeves, film posters etc. It seems to have disappeared from the web |
| www.swinginchicks.com | This is a general artists' site despite the misleading domain name and has only a small entry for MF. However, her entry is fun. |
See also
Placeholder /// see www.mariannefaithfull.com 9-2005 onwards ///
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