Peter's music has been heard on hundreds of radio stations and has been on SiriusXM rotation for over a decade. As a multi-award winning artist, Peter's music has also topped Billboard's Classical and Crossover charts.
For Captain Beefheart, a maverick-artist-musician, who was not just a complicated man but highly demanding and by most accounts very difficult to deal with. It was appropriate that Beefheart's Magic Band was to prominently feature a bassist as accomplished, bold and adventurous as Mark Boston, a.k.a Rockette Morton.
Born on July 14, 1949, Mark began life in the small town of Salem, Illinois before his family moved out to Lancaster, California when he was 13. With a bassist and steel player for a father, Mark gained a great appreciation for country and bluegrass along with the R&B and rock’n’roll that was on the rise. Within a year of the Boston clan moving out to Lancaster, Mark befriended a young guitarist by the name of Bill Harkleroad.
At a time when the bass guitar was seen as the dummy’s instrument, Mark left quite an impression on Bill with his talent and equipment, leading to the two joining forces to form BC And The Cavemen. With Mark’s mother sewing some outfits for them, the band developed a decent reputation, and the two would also play in a band with Jeff Cotton and John French known as Blues In A Bottle. And then a local hero came calling. Or perhaps screaming and howling!
In that same Lancaster scene, Captain Beefheart And His Magic Band were making a big splash as a top flight blues rock outfit, with 'Safe As Milk' having made a strong impression and 'Strictly Personal' being a strong record as well. But even with a sound that was speaking to people, one that perhaps would have been a more pragmatic one as far as a career goes, Don Van Vliet just wasn’t meant for conventional norms.
The Captain had all these ideas, ideas far too out for many, including early members. He needed new musicians, younger and more impressionable ones that wouldn’t object to his ideas. Already having John and Jeff in the band, now 'Drumbo' and Antennae Jimmy Semens, he then recruited Bill, dubbed Zoot Horn Rollo. And on bass, he found Mark Boston, who took the name Rockette Morton due to his love of outer space. And the classic Magic Band was born.
Trout Mask Replica (TMR) wasn’t an easy album to make. Yet even with all the bizarre ideas and the difficulty in preparing those ideas into music, Mark was a total champ through it all. The Beefheart sound is one of great dichotomy, and Mark can capture all of it. He’s so tight and precise, and yet there’s this raw grit and dirt. He’s highly intelligent and sophisticated in his playing, and yet there remains this childlike sense of wonder and curiosity.
He takes after all the great traditional American music, yet out into a whole other realm of time and space. The bass traditionally serves the role of grounding the harmony while locking in with the drums to provide a foundation, yet Mark’s playing often serves as another melody line in the music. In a lot of ways, he’s like a third guitarist that just happens to be playing bass.
The TMR on its own is a legacy few can compete with, and yet Mark contributed to more classic records like "Lick My Decals Off, Baby", "The Spotlight Kid", and "Clear Spot". There on Decals, you get the equivalent of Godfather II. With Mother Art Tripp on marimba and drums rather Jeff on guitar, you get an album that captures a great deal of TMR's brilliance while being brilliant in its own unique way.
Then you get to 'The Spotlight Kid', with bass godliness on cuts like “When It Blows Its Stack”, resulting in a bass solo that often opened shows, yet Mark proves himself just as talented on traditional in-the-pocket styles as demonstrated on cuts like “I’m Gonna Booglarize You Baby”. And that thing about bassists being failed guitarists? In the 'Clear Spot', with Mark taking guitar and the rhythm section now being a mini Mothers reunion of Art and Roy Estrada, yet nobody missed a beat. Throughout the record, Bill and Mark’s kinship really shines, their weaving right there with what Bill and Jeff had done, or what was done with Alex St Clair early on.
Of course, dealing with Don was quite a task of its own, so it’s inevitable that Mark and the others would all end up departing by 1974. He and Bill soon formed a group of their own called Mallard. For two albums, the first with Art and having some writing help from John French 'Drumbo', Mallard showed itself a pretty decent blues rock outfit. And giving that it was Mark who finally had a chance to create something that was truly his own rather than helping some achieve their vision, it’s understandably the work that he takes pride in. And over time, he’d end up making a solo record and create some cool artwork of his own, as well as performing with 'Drumbo' in the reformed Magic Band, allowing the music to live and breathe on stage again.
If you’re a Beefheart fan, how can you not love Rockette Morton? Not only a uniquely talented bass player but such a great stage presence full of joy, along with a lovably quirky personality and such a sweet guy. Easily one of my favorites from Magic Band members, you can’t help but smile when thinking about Mark. He’s been through some rough weather, including his health scares, and yet he’s still the same Mark we’ve known and loved all the years.
Happy birthday Mark! Thank you for all you have given us and look forward to more.
___________________
Patrick Moore is a freehand drawing artist and freelance music writer.
Agencies TORONTO: Immigration is fast changing the linguistic landscape of Canada. And Punjabi tops the list of the 10 immigrant languages spoken most at home, according to the 2011 census of population. Punjabi is followed by Chinese, Cantonese, Spanish, Tagalog, Arabic, Mandarin, Italian, Urdu and German, according to the census. But if speakers of Cantonese, Mandarin & Chinese n.o.s (not otherwise specified) are taken together, they become a million-plus-strong group, pushing Punjabi to the second place among the immigrant languages most spoken at home. In fact, 460,000 people reported speaking Punjabi at home, as per the 2011 the census. In the Toronto area, 8 percent of immigrants spoke Punjabi, 8.8 percent Cantonese, 5.9 percent Urdu and 5.7 percent Tamil at home. In all, 1,790,000 people in the Toronto area - Canada's largest metropolitan area - reported speaking an immigrant language at home. Which means that 32.2 percent of the Toronto population speaks languages other than English and French at home. In the Vancouver area, 712,000 people - 31 percent of the population - spoke an immigrant language at home. Punjabi was on the top, with 17.7 percent of these people saying that they spoke this language at home, 16 percent spoke Cantonese, 12.2 percent Chinese n.o.s, 11.8 percent Mandarin and 6.7 percent Tagalog (of the Philippines) at home. Not surprisingly, the number of English speakers at home in both the metropolitan centres of Toronto and Vancouver is declining. While the number of English speakers at home in Toronto fell from 59.1 percent from 2006 to 55 percent in 2011, these figures declined from 62 percent in 2006 to 58 percent in 2011. Clearly, Canada is becoming less of an English-speaking nation. Over 200 languages are spoken in Canadian homes, making it the foremost country on the planet in terms of languistic diversity. As for the use of Canada’s two official languages at home, English is spoken by 58 percent - or 19,225,000 Canadians - and French by 18.2 percent - or 6,043,000 Canadians. The use of both these languages at home has come down slightly since 2006. One-fifth of Canadians - nearly 6,630,000 people- speak a language other than English or French at home in 2011, according to the census. Surprisingly, Hindi and Bengali are among the immigrant languages which have seen a huge jump in the number of their users since 2006. While the use of Hindi increased 44 percent, Bengali speakers registered 40 percent growth. These two Indian languages are among eight languages that have registered a growth of 30 percent since 2006. The other languages to post such growth are Mandarin (50 percent), Arabic (47 percent), Creole (42 percent), Persian (33 percent) and Spanish (32 percent). On the other hand, four languages - Chinese, Italian, Polish and Greek - reported a decline in the number of users since the last census. Reacting to the news, Sadhu Binning, who is a known Punjabi writer in Canada and also taught Punjabi at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, said in his facebook posting, "Punjabis living in Canada should be proud of themselves. In the last census (2011), they demonstrated that they are proud of their mother tongue. At least 460,000 people across Canada said that their mother tongue is Punjabi. We know that there are more Punjabis than this number... but this is a moment of joy. CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL PUNJABIS IN CANADA.'' READ ALSO: In Vancouver, Punjabi language becomes a job getter
admin: Nitin Kumar
punjabi rocksssssss
Like · Reply · 4y
Manpreet Singh
CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL PUNJABIS IN CANADA
Like · Reply · 3 · 4y
Michi David Wylde
loser,mothrfkrs indians
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Jobanjeet Singh
David Wylde go fuck yourself...........cause more punjabis are comming to canada every year...........mla's mp's defence minister u name it
Like · Reply · 1 · 3y
Ashfaq Meher
punjabi language like as mother Fragrance
Like · Reply · 2 · 3y
Satyabrata Das
Very nice
Like · Reply · 3y
Michi David Wylde
hate this fukn punjabi,dirty brownies spoiling canada
Like · Reply · 3y
Michi David Wylde
go back to third world -india.i'll cut thse brownies stinky balls n sent bck u to where u belong.mothrfkr indians
Like · Reply · 3y
Harry Sandhu
if u have guts, then come to india we show u who is motherfucker
Like · Reply · 1 · 3y
Bhopinder Pal Singh
Dear David, Any Harm done by punjabi,to you are to Canada
deepak: very nice
Prof. Kuldip Pelia: Punjabi is the most-spoken immigrant language in Canada, according to Census Canada 2011.
Prof. Kuldip Pelia: After English, Punjabi is the most-spoken language in British Columbia, Metro Vancouver, Surrey, Abbotsford, Brampton, and Metro Calgary. Punjab is also the 10th most-spoken language in the World. In Canadian provinces like BC, Alberta and Ontario, number of Punjabi speakers is much higher than French. It makes sense to become an English-Punjabi bilingual these days in Canada.
The Khalsa: Singh,Sikh and Khalsa Is best
Ahmed: i respect you but there is not just Sikh Punjabi. There is also Muslim Punjabi.
jashandeep singh: Rabba vasda rahe punjab ate punjabi maa boli teri kirpa naal
Satnam singh: Punjabia di shaan wakhri
Dilpreet Singh: Punjabi sadi maa aa .. te jehre tutch log punjabi bolan ch sharm mehsus krde aa ohna nu ni pta ki maa nu dukhi krdek kadi koi sukh ni pa skda
B P SINGH: No Sarkar ,
You are wrong , Pakistani Punjabi is better than Indian in depth. How ever India being bigger country thus more visible
B P SINGH: PUNJABI IS PUNJABI , INDIAN OR PAKI
B P SINGH: Dear Abrar,
Please confirm this book available in gurmukhi as my knowledge in shahmukhi is poor
Bhopinder Pal Singh Maidh
Punjabi is sweet and Gurbani can be originally read in Punjabi Gurmukhi! I am lucky to be a part of it!: Newseastwest is very nice site from where I learn n do the CHERRYPIC!!!
Bhangu: Jeevay maa boli Pynjabi.
Bhangu: Every Punjabi is our brother. A temporary line cannot divide our beloved mother land for ever. Punjab was, is and always be one
Marathi Status: Hey there! This post couldn't be written any better!
Reading through this post reminds me of my
good old room mate! He always kept talking about this. I will forward
this post to him. Pretty sure he will have a good read.
Thanks for sharing!
abrar ahmed: Dear All,
My ebook in urdu has already been published by the Canadian publisher. My second book which is in punjabi is ready to be
published. If any one of punjabi speaking wish to have more
information are advised to contact me directtly.
Regard
Abrar Ahmed
[email protected]
udayan sarkar: but the actual credit goes to indian punjabi language gurmukhi which is followed not shahmukhi so it is india who have made proud
Muhammad Ashfaq: jadoon bacha maan de akhosh vich ja ke ik khas khashboo mohsos karda ei
eise tara jadon koi punjabi bolda ei te manu apni paan di khushboo andi ei
santosh singh: punjabis are great people
Zulfiqar Haider: Vakhari shan Punjbian di. Does not matter Sikh ya Muslim per Punjabi is Punjabi.
Naee rysaan Punjbian Dian
Aman: ek side Canada ch Punjabi de percentage tutan dae ya
dusre side apne India ch kuch aekhoje namune vi mil jaande yaa jinna nu apni Maa Boli Punjabi bolan ch Sharam aundi yaa
Ma Boli International Punjabi Film Festival, Vancouver 2014: Thanks So Much for Sharing .
Saurabh: Punjabiyan di shaan wakhri. Proud to be a Sikh!!
Balwant Sanghera: It is great news for the well wishers of Punjabi. Now is the time for the Punjabi community to encourage more signage and services in Punjabi across the land ,especially in places where there are substantial numbers of Punjabi speakers. Canada has now become not only a truly multicultural but also a multilingual country. It makes us all proud.
lachman: somewhere i read if all the south asian languages were lumped together (punjabi, hindi, tamil, singalese,urdu,bengali, marathi...) it outnumbers all the chinese languages spoken. 
