Search - Paul Mark & The Van Dorens, Paul Mark :: Stowaways

Like the soundtrack from a forgotten noir masterpiece. A sentimental world-gone-mad portfolio, flaunting influences as far afield as Weimar caberet, tin pan alley and after-hours combo jazz. Piano ballads, wheezing cabaret oddities and honky tonk rants that slice through the midnight fog like bummed cigarettes and cut-rate bourbon.

Stowaways is Paul Mark's tenth CD release. His piano and acoustic bass playing sit front and center along with his signature saloon-weary vocals. Along with Mark's signature quirky instrumentations - including harmonium, B3 organ, xylophone, oddly-tuned guitars - a Salvation Army-ready string section lends street corner polish to the affair.

Highlights includes originals How Do the Blind Become So Famous?, Stowaways, and Bridge to Nowhere. Tess Primack's Broadway-sweet vocals mash-up ironically against Mark's on the barroom duet-ballad Once Upon a Weekend. The set includes a startling cover the Brecht/Weill opus Ballad of Mack the Knife which has next to nothing to do with Bobby Darin's '59 hit version. The sweeping set closer Animal Cruelty is a lament for a lost companion - or rather the cycle of of such loses - that confuse the human heart

A creative peak for an ambitious and unique artist.

Produced by Paul Mark
Recorded in New York City
Mixed by Paul Mark & Jeff Powell at Ardent Studios, Memphis TN
Mix engineer: Lucas Peterson
Mastered by Bruce Barielle, New Orleans