Search - Money Mark :: Mark's Keyboard Repair

Flava-filled, funky, delightfully old-skool.....

Ryan Schweitzer | Bismarck, ND USA | 08/28/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"One of my favorite CD's in my collection!!! The vibe of this album has a very analog, organic, old-skool (for want of a better term), and sometimes mellow feel, it's just the disc to listen to with your mahogany console stereo (if you've got the rare UK vinyl pressing of this album) in your den with the red shag carpet & knotty pine paneling, with the naugahyde chairs, lava lamp, and sunburst clock!! :)My favorite track on the album has to be "Pinto's New Car", with a lot of flavaful groove that leaves plenty left over for the rest of songs on the album. I also read somewhere that Money Mark recorded these songs long before he met the Beasties when they were recording Paul's Boutique in '89 (and became the 4th beastie boy soon after) to fix a entry gate to their driveway at the mansion that the B-Boys were recording at in Silverlake in LA (Mark is a carpenter by trade as well), so I'm assuming some of these songs on this album are probably around 15-20 years old! All the better... :-)All of these songs were independently released by Mark on a series of EPs on his own Pinto Records label a while before this album came out, which is a re-issue of these EPs all combined together.Once again, this is a disc I *highly* recommend..."

"Keyboard" needs no repair

E. A Solinas | MD USA | 02/10/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"When he's not the fourth Beastie Boy, Mark Ramos Nishita creates some wicked solo music as Money Mark -- lo-fi, funky, fuzzy, and entrancingly spacey. How to describe it? A colorful, twisted rollercoaster ride through a Hammond organ and Moog, as Money Mark explores every experimental nook and cranny.



It opens with the slow-grinding, chunky "Pretty Pain," before lifting off to mixtures of soul-jazz and funk, done against a blippy backdrop of thick, dense organ and blippy keyboard. Most of the songs are two-ish minutes or under, but somehow that seems just right -- if they were any longer, they would seem stretched out.



And Money Mark also augments the music with jam sessions, bells, thick distortion over droned vocals, lessons on entomology, and sputtering electric organ. It's impossible to describe every facet of Money Mark's sound; it's far too complex, but that complexity never bogs it down. It trips merrily in its colorful trappings, rarely slowing down.



Few albums really mesmerize, never boring listeners with a single song. Thankfully, Money Mark achieved that in "Mark's Keyboard Repair" -- not one song, be it pretty or gritty, gets dull. There's a feeling of delighted anticipation throughout the album -- what will he pull out of his hat next? Acid jazz, or funky electronica? Distortion or organ? Sparkles or sputters?



Since all these songs were originally released as a series of EPs, there really isn't any internal flow. But it feels like there is. There's nothing to link the songs directly, but Money Mark's distinct musical style and unique electro-jazz sound seems to band them together.



Nishita's vocals feature in quite a few songs, but aren't the centerpiece of those songs. Instead, he uses his flat intonations like another instrument, blending them perfectly with his expert use of electric organ and moog, mixed in with basic acoustic jazz. Best of all, he both layers the two sounds over one another, then alternates them -- it never gets dull or simplistic.



Money Mark created a truly unique collection with "Mark's Keyboard Repair." A heady mix of electronica, jazz, funk and experimental twiddles, this is a minor masterpiece."