Marti Jones

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Marti Jones is a singer and painter originally from Uniontown, Ohio.

Jones was initially a member of the band Color Me Gone, who recorded one EP for A&M Records in 1983. Her first solo album, 1985's "Unsophisticated Time" (A&M), was produced by Don Dixon. Jones and Dixon subsequently married, and Dixon continued to produce all of his wife's subsequent albums.

Two more albums for A&M followed in the 1980s, each of them featuring a wide range of supporting musicians (including Marshall Crenshaw, Mitch Easter, The Uptown Horns, Paul Carrack, T-Bone Burnett, Darlene Love and many others). Jones' sound encompassed jangle-pop, ballads, and even southern-style soul material. Her voice and singing style reminded some observers of Dusty Springfield, who mined a similarly eclectic field of pop music; others compared her voice to that of Linda Ronstadt, Bonnie Raitt, or Annie Lennox.

Jones' albums featured both original material (mostly written by Dixon, or Dixon and Jones together), and covers of songs by singer/songwriters such as Janis Ian, Elvis Costello, John Hiatt, Jackie DeShannon, and Graham Parker. For a move to the RCA label in 1990, Jones relied more heavily on original material and adapted a somewhat more adult-contemporary sound. She was dropped by RCA after one album (Any Kind Of Lie). On subsequent recordings, she returned to her customary mix of originals and covers.

In the past few years, Jones has curtailed her singing career and has focused on painting (under the name Marti Jones Dixon). She did, however, tour with singer/songwriter Amy Rigby as "The Cynical Girls" in 2005. Then in 2008, she and her husband released Lucky Stars: New Lullabies for Old Souls a download-only album credited to Marti Jones & Don Dixon. Billed as an album of "calm, soothing music" (and as a departure from both Jones' and Dixon's previous sound), it featured six vocal songs and five instrumentals.