CREATIVE CONVERSATIONS 130: MARTY COBCROFT ON HIS EARLY CAREER AND LIVING WITH PARKINSON'S DISEASE
Words by Sam Elliott.
Marty Cobcroft is an Australian music scene veteran, but is very happy to keep his name out of the limelight and showcase his talents behind the scenes working for many years as a session musician. He has probably aided in the soundtrack of your childhood through his amazing musicianship, making jingles and tunes for some iconic Aussie favourite shows, advertisements, and musicians. As well as his notable track record with session music, he himself has released some brilliant works.
In 2018, Marty was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease, a motor neurone disease that affects patients through a suite of symptoms. Marty never lost his passion, or his talent, in the music world and continues to record phenomenal works today. He wants to show others that you can still do what you love even if there are some physical setbacks.
Most recently, Marty, along with the help of his long time friend Andy Payne, released an album, Free Bird. The album itself is brilliant. Each track is meticulously crafted and creates a wonderful auditory experience. Not to mention the care Marty has in making these tracks and collection of works is meticulous, so the production vale is simply spectacular. Something special about this album and collection of songs is that Marty has graciously decided to donate 50 per cent of all the album sales to Parkinson’s NSW, a not-for-profit organisation in NSW that has an aim to make life easier for people with Parkinson’s.
Futuremag Music’s Sam Elliott sat down with Marty for a fun chat about his early career, music inspiration, living with Parkinson’s and of course his newest gem, Free Bird.
FMM: Hi Marty! Starting off in your career, you were a session musician. Why session music and not sliding into the pop world for example?
Marty: I am a very private person. I have a very small circle of close friends because I manage life better that way. Session work to me seemed to be a great way of honing your skills as a singer, but also doing a lot of varied work in an area where musicians don’t really tread. Although I did a lot of live work, and it was fun, I always preferred the session. That problem-solving to me is really appealing. I fell into session work quickly, in my late teens. The band I was in, the bass player, Mike Carter, now plays for a band calmly Swanny. I was helping out Clive from Sherbert. Mick had met him somehow.
Clive was very helpful in the slot of ways that he didn’t realise I think. If I do some session stuff, I can do some studio time. It was a happenstance thing. I just liked singing. I joined a band; that’s what you did in the 70s. You joined a band, you grew your hair and your parents were disgusted with you, “why don’t you get a real job!”
FMM: Did you always know you were going to go into music?
Marty: My grandmother said when I was three years old there was a series called Bandstand. Apparently, I was glued to it. Whenever I heard music, I would just be glued to it. I remember thinking “This is magical, how do they do this.” It was always there, this want to play.
FMM: Did you have bands and musicians you were drawn to?
Marty: It’s the hook of the song. I remember listening to the Beatles for the first time and I was speechless. How do they do this? Then I heard Cliff Richard. I would listen to the radio religiously. I liked the British pop scene. We didn’t get a lot of American stuff then. From my experience, it was Cliff Richard and The Shadows, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones. London was the happening place.
FMM: Were there any particular career highlights in this period?
Marty: A few would have been a Toyota Ute ad, revamping the Funniest Home Videos opening credits, the original Getaway theme song.
FMM: You were pretty much in every Aussies lounge rooms for a few years! How does it feel to have your music compositions out there?
Marty: I remember the first time I heard myself on the radio I was vacuuming. I remember thinking to myself, I wonder if Billy Joel does this? It was a humbling moment *Laughs*
FMM: Now we will jump forward a bit and go into where things started to change with your diagnosis with Parkinson’s Disease. How far along were you when you got diagnosed?
Marty: I was diagnosed in August 2018. 15 years prior to that, I was having a lot of problems with back pain. Some mornings I couldn’t get up. I went to a chiropractor, physios, and doctors and they couldn’t figure out why I had this pain. I started to think “Is this all in my head?” But it wasn’t, it was a pre-cursor to Parkinson’s.
After that, I started to get a slight tremor. In 2016, I was in a chiro for my back, still on a search for what was wrong with my back, and she said I had a slight tremor in the leg, and suggested I see a neurologist. Being a typical Australian male I thought “I’ll be right, she’ll be right,” you know? After about a month my chiropractor checked in to see if I had seen a neurologist. I hadn’t, and I thought “I’m not going to get away with this” so I booked to see a neurologist.
The whole diagnosis process took about eight months, seeing what worked and what didn’t work and I started to get worried. Your mind goes to lots of weird and wonderful places. Eventually, the neurologist gave me a drug that they use to treat Parkinson's. I took the drug and it stopped the tremor.
FMM: I’m sorry to hear this, this must have been a difficult period.
Marty: That was the beginning of intense study on my part. For hours, I poured through the internet, reading as much as I could. I had all these symptoms over the past 20 years. I really believe I had undiagnosed Parkinson’s in my late 30s I just didn’t know.
I had phantom pain I couldn’t explain. I lost my sense of smell 10 years ago. It’s funny what your brain adapts to without you telling it. I brought my wife this perfume I like and we were going out for our anniversary. She asked me, “Do you notice anything?” Always a difficult question. Very difficult question to ask a man, so I went, “Your hair looks lovely”. And she said, “Can’t you smell it?” All these things were popping up, one of the first non-motor symptoms. It is a suite of symptoms; there are up to 50 of them.
FMM: So you, like many other Aussies, hadn't heard a lot about Parkinson’s disease before you were diagnosed?
Marty: I’d heard of it, but I didn’t know what it was. It is relentless. A disease of complete discomfort. The thing about Parkinson’s is, it does not want you to do anything but what it wants to do, so it can grab hold of you. The key thing that helps me is action, exercise, and movement. If you do nothing, it will make you pay for that. You need to do something. It changed my life instantly. It really is life on life’s terms, you don’t have any say on it.
FMM: I know you have a strong outlook on living with Parkinson’s, not you say you won’t let it win.
Marty: I refuse to be a victim of anything or anyone. I can’t be a victim. That does not mean I’m a big, tough, strong guy. My natural instinct is to come out swinging and do everything I can within my capabilities to make my life as comfortable as can be. It’s exhausting unless you stay on top of the research.
There are leaps and bounds in Parkinson's research, but it costs money and the funding comes largely from places like Parkinson’s NSW, who have to raise their own money. Less than 10 per cent comes from the government. The biggest neurological illness in Australia is dementia, the next one is Parkinson's. I’m 62 now. There are days where you feel 82. It is common for me to get up and feel like I’ve been beaten up.
FMM: When you have these hard days, how do you provide yourself with some respite?
Marty: When you start your day with pain. You have to have a regiem that takes you mind of it for a while. This is why music, apart from the exercises I have been doing, has been the one thing that helps. When I am playing I don’t have Parkinson’s
FMM: With the diagnosis, did you see a significant change in your relationship with music?
Marty: No matter where I have been in my life, where I’ve lived, and who I’ve lived with, it’s the one constant. It’s always been there. I think when I got diagnosed, my first thought was I was not going to be able to play anymore, because a lot of the time it affects your voice.
I went to an EMT and she told me there was nothing wrong. My muscles and larynx weren’t affected as I am musical. It also hasn’t affected the dexterity in my fingers. When I get tremors, I can’t play. The tremor affects my whole arm.
FMM: You were telling me you work a lot with fellow musician and good friend of yours, Andy Payne. Tell me a little bit about you and Andy’s relationship.
Marty: I’ve known him a long time. We were young men when we first met. I think I was around 34/35 and I was in a band that was being put together. We had trouble getting a bass player and a drummer. I remember I knew about Andy from the same sort of people. I knew Andy would be good. I thought to myself, “Can we get Andy Payne in?”
We hit it off. He’s a knock-out bass player, but he’s also a great musician. You hand him anything and he’s a world-class musician at it. It was fun. We got on like a house on fire. After that, I wanted to make an album and we had made a habit out of visiting once or twice a week
FMM: Tell me about the work you created and the processes of working as a pair.
Marty: My first album was called Patchwork. We just patched together bits and pieces of songs. It was raw but it was something I wanted to do. I finally got to do it. Sundance was the next work we did and it was a little more polished. Then for a few years, life just got in the way. I moved away and for a period of time, we were still in touch from time to time and then he had some things in his life he was dealing with; playing with some high-profile acts here. getting the work. Last year, we got in touch and he said, “It’s about time we got back together” and I said “Great” and he came up and we eased back into this arrangement. We still got on like a house on fire.
FMM: What is the process like for you two as a duo?
Marty: He is the only musician I have sat down with consistently who knows instinctively what I want in a track. He will have it there before I even say it. It is outstanding, and it’s a vice-versa thing. There is this constant bouncing between each other. I can’t explain it, it’s always been like that. It helps that we’re good friends as we can always have a laugh. The first session we had back here it was like a telepathic kind of thinking. Working with Andy is not work at all, for the seven to eight hours he’s here on a Wednesday, I don’t have Parkinson’s. The first time he came up, we sat down together. We came up with about four or five songs.
FMM: Now you've very recently released your Free Bird Album. What is Free Bird to you?
Marty: When I looked at the lyrics, it was about Parkinson's. I didn’t intend it to be that way. I wrote it in about ten minutes. I have no idea where it came from. I can’t even remember when I wrote that song. Some songs are memorable; you remember where you were and what time you wrote it. Others seem to appear. Free Bird is about loss, but it is also about someone else’s freedom.
FMM: 50 per cent of your album sales of Free Bird go to Parkinson's NSW. A wonderful initiative! Why did you decide to give them half your sales?
Marty: They were so helpful when I first got my diagnosis. I found out about them through web research. I rang them up, they were so nice and helpful, they told me about the NDIS, which I didn’t know anything about at the time. They just get things done. When I was doing this album, I thought to myself, I’m not really good at anything else. I can’t make tables, I’m not good with my hands I can’t draw. I can play music, I thought maybe there is a way I can say thank you and contribute a little bit with what I can do. That’s where the idea came from. I wanted to help raise some money.