ad hoc - mark

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Mark started piano lessons at the age of 4 (in 1978) and eventually switched to guitar at age 15. He started writing his own tunes when he was 17 and still pulls a few oldies out around the campfire. He grew up listening to cheesy 50's songs his dad liked on the local oldies station, such as Ahab the Arab, and eventually heard the Beatles enough to work enough to buy his first album, Magical Mystery Tour, in sixth grade, though he was gifted Police Synchronicity first a few years earlier (his sister made him trade in Thriller for Sting and Prince).

In junior high he played that Beatles album so much that eventually an older friend threw it out the window of his truck on the way to a scout jamboree and subsequently copied him Abbey Road and Rust Never Sleeps, and from Neil Young his musical journey visited Zeppelin, Floyd, Hendrix, Janis, Jim, Credence, Byrds, Dylan, the Dead... and into Bluegrass. During high school, he played with the Rolling Shaloms ( see Alex Palmer and the Country Jism) and the River Llamas (see guitarist Brian Lundeen with the Kind Herbs and drummer Aaron Biggar from Blacktop Bage www.blacktopbadge.com/news.htm ).This was also the time of his introduction to mandolin, harmonica, butt beat box and electric bass guitar, though he mainly stuck to his Rickenbacker.

At UW-Eau Claire he started as a music therapy student but ended up studying world religions and anthropology. During this time, his appreciation for classic rock grew while he was introduced to more jazz and funk. James Brown is still the only thing that can keep him awake when driving at 3AM across a country. Close friend and jam buddy, Chris Vatland, helped him stay in the musical know by giving him many mixed taped to expand his frame of reference. He wrote many songs during this period and played with Inertia and the Freq's (pronounced freaks) as well as solo acoustic with close friend and roommate Andy Widmann accompanying on percussion.

After graduating from Wisconsin, he went with keyboard player Jason Hedrington (see Insidious Rays, et cetera) to Bethlehem, PA to form Emergent Evolution which released it debut album in 2000. This is a killer album with great layering if you can get your hands on it (you might also be able so find some live recording on the net via google). Here he studied jazz guitar and scat for a spell and was forcefully introduced and later dug willingly Zappa, Ween, and the East Coast scene. After 5 years there, he went home to Minnesota for 9 months and played with the Lonesome Fools (bluegrass band) recording Least Amount of Lines for a Twin Cities based anti-war album in 2002 before the start of the second Gulf War.

We now approach his current phase of writing in ChiaYi, Taiwan, R.O.C., 2003 to present. Here he played and wrote with Darren Chilton in the Doctor's Wong and is currently working with ad hoc. Taiwan has introduced Mark to all kinds of new genres and styles. Admittedly, "Beard" can now listen to techno music without getting sick, though he still has some problems with the local KTV singers. Besides writing music for himself and the ad hoc band (wait 'til ya hear the new stuff), he and his wife Georgina also write EFL children's songs which they hope to publish in a collection in years to come (word out for prospective EFL/children's publishing companies). In his own words from the song recorded live in studio for Z rock station WZZO in 2003, Keep On Keepin' On! (Mark likes writing about himself in the third person, hope you enjoyed readin' it, pardon any run-ons and parenthesis

Peace