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.
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Patrick Moore is a freehand drawing artist and freelance music writer.
Agencies
Toronto: Film director Jayant Digambar Somalkar’s debut Marathi film Sthal (A Match) won the top Asian award at the just concluded Toronto International Film Festival for its sheer raw power.
The film is the story of the fight of a young woman against the oppressive patriarchy which forces its decisions on her life.
Dedicating the NETPAC (Network for the Promotion of Asia Pacific Cinema) award to “all the brave women of the world who challenge their adverse circumstances,” Somalkar said this film is also very personal to him “as it was shot in my hometown where I was born.”
Meenakshi Shedde, who as TIFF’s Senior Programme Advisor for South Asia was instrumental in bringing the film to this festival, said, “I am absolutely delighted with the NETPAC Award going to Sthal (A Match).”
She said, “It is a raw and powerful film about women who are paraded before potential suitors to arrange their marriages. It’s extremely humiliating for them as they are treated like slaves or products. They are assessed for…what is your name, what is your height, what is your education, can you cook, can you farm … and no question is ever asked of the boys. This process of leading to marriage (hopefully) is so humiliating and devastating for the girls’ families – both financially and psychologically.”
Shedde said the award for this film at the world’s premier film festival also assumes significance as the film subtly highlights the deep economic distress in the so-called farmers’ suicide belt of the Vidharbha region of Maharashtra.
“This film is the director’s biographical story as he shot it in his house and own village of Dongargaon in the cotton belt which is also tragically called the farmers’ suicide belt in the Vidharbha region. So he is also addressing the deeper socio-economic issues in which he places the context of this extremely powerful film.”
She added, “The minute I saw the film I think one of the things that attracted me terribly was that it has a raw and wonderful authentic energy which is very distinct from other kinds of film-making where the original voice may be lost or over-polished. But A Match has that raw and original power.”
Lachman: while working with a finance co in mumbai back in the 80s i would go collect money from the cotton lords in inner maharashtra for investment into fds and have witnessed this ( happens all over india even today and even in high society matches at the TAJ PALACE Sea lounge in mumbai). Once on the way back to mumbai i stopped to attend nature's call in the woods and heard a baby crying who was abandoned . my driver told me must be a girl child left to die. i cudn't bear that thought and took child to nearest village to find out if she was from there. The head of village told me that i found her and it is God's wish that she becomes my child so take her. To cut a long story short that girl is now a professor lat NYU in new york city. 
