Former Faith No More guitarist Jim Martin celebrates his 48th birthday today. The then distinctive-looking axeman was a crucial component of the early Faith No More sound – especially The Real Thing – but after years of tension he was sacked in November 1993.

He has since released one solo album, Milk in Blood in 1997.  He has also released records as part of  Behemoth and Fang and with Anand Bhatt while he also appeared on Metallica’s Garage Inc album. More recently he is reported to have retired from making music and famously focused on pumpkin growing instead. Check out two interviews here and here in which Jim speaks about his pumpkin passion.

Jim solo stuff

Jim in quotes
“By the making of Angel Dust in 1992, the line between the stage and reality became indistinct. [New singer] Mike Patton was having a reaction to sudden fame, and [keyboardist] Roddy [Bottum] was distant. Everyone was convinced they couldn’t continue with me in the band, so I sold my interest and we dissolved our partnership.”
Blender 2004

“It took a lot of time to recover from those years. It was an awful lot of work. No weekends, no settling, no family. You hear about how glamorous being in a successful band is, but it’s not everything you might think it would be.”
Oakland Tribune 2005

“Growing these isn’t all that different than what I used to do in music. If you want to be good, you have to give it what it needs.”
On pumpkins, Oakland Tribune 2005

Others on Jim
“Jim was a night owl. He’d stay up until about 5am, and then sleep through the afternoon. The two of us worked on our own in the studio. Jim had come up with a lot of music for the album, including Surprise! You’re Dead! (which actually goes back to a 1970s band called Agents Of Misfortune, featuring Jim and future Metallica bassist Cliff Burton), Zombie Eaters and Falling To Pieces. We’d be finished by about 10pm, and then go out to party.”
Mike Bordin on The Real Thing recording
Metal Hammer 2009

“There’s always been arguments about that – Jim’s always said he quit. He didn’t. I fired him by fax. It was the only way of getting hold of him! Getting rid of him was a real cleansing exercise. There’s no point keeping someone in the band who’s only there for the money or something. Jim wasn’t committed to what the band wanted to do. I’m good at sacking band members. And by fax was such a… 90s way of doing things.”
Roddy Bottum
Metal Hammer 2009

“Jim Martin had always been very conventional in what he wanted to do with the band, very much a fan of guitar music only and metal specifically. During the recording of ‘Angel Dust’ it became apparent to both him and us that we were heading in very different directions.”
Roddy Bottum
Metal Hammer 2009

“We weren’t having a good time together and it was pretty obvious. We saw it coming for too long, while we were making the Angel Dust album. The whole time for two years while we were touring we kept hoping it would get better. After that much time you can’t help but feel like an idiot for feeling that way. Basically, what it came down to was he couldn’t hold up his weight musically.”
Mike Patton
Interview from 1995 in Negele Gig Database