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
NEW YORK: It is June 1. Happy birthday, Marilyn Monroe.
Hollywood’s iconic blonde bombshell, who was born Norma Jeane in a Los Angeles hospital on this day (June 1, 1926) and died of a drug overdose at the age of 36 in August 1962, was much more than the sex symbol that film studios had created for her.
After the success of her films such as The Seven Year Itch (1953) and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1955) Hollywood studios wanted to keep her as their saleable sex symbol. But Marilyn didn’t want that as she had become a big star now. She wanted to be taken seriously by the studios and given serious roles. She went to New York in 1954 to join Lee Strasberg’s Actors Studio so that she would get serious roles later.
Marilyn never knew who her real father was. Probably that’s why she was drawn to father figures, to intellectual men who were much older than herself. That explains her marriage to America’s best playwright and much older Arthur Miller – from 1956 to 1960.
Marilyn and actress Shelley Winters were roommates for one year when they were young struggling actresses in Hollywood.
Shelley, who went on to win two Oscars, said in a 1987 TV interview that she and Marilyn ``were both very young and struggling. We were blonde Hollywood babies. We used to sit in Schwab’s drugstore (famous pharmacy on Sunset Boulevard where young aspiring actors frequenting Hollywood studios used to meet) and fantasize about the future...having glorious careers and of course one of the prefect husbands and prefect children.’’
Shelley said Marilyn respected intellect. "While I was busy going out with handsome young movie stars, she was attracted to father figures...old men who were very smart.’’
Recalling Marilyn’s fantasy for old intellectual men, Shelley said on David Letterman’s Late Night Show in 1989, "Marilyn didn’t like anybody under 50...if you didn’t have grey hair. One day, we were both getting unhappy over our love affairs and we decided that why shouldn’t we be like men...just go over and sleep with who you think is attractive. Anyway, we decided that we will make a list (of attractive men) and show each other after an hour. On her (Marilyn’s) list were people like Einstein, Ralph Bunche.... On my list were Clark Gable, Brando and things like that.''
Marilyn Monroe Albert Einstein affair happened?
On seeing Albert Einstein's name on Marilyn's list, Shelley told her, "Marilyn, there’s no way you can sleep with Albert Einstein. He’s the most famous scientist of the century. Besides, he’s an old man.â€
Marilyn’s reply was, "That has nothing to do with it. I hear he’s very healthy.â€
Did Marilyn ever meet Einstein and have a love affair with him?
Shelley told David Letterman on his show, "Many years after her (Marilyn’s) death, I was in the Strasbergs’ apartment (in New York) and there was a silver framed picture of Albert Einstein on a piano and on it was written: `With love, respect and thanks. Albert Einstein’.’’
The Strasbergs – Lee and Paula – were Marilyn’s foster parents and much of her estate after her death went to them.
[caption id="attachment_80432" align="alignnone" width="800"]
Marilyn Monroe in a funny scene with Tony Curtis (middle) and Jack Lemmon (left) in the film Some Like It Hot.[/caption]
According to Shelley, Marilyn was no dumb blonde as she was a voracious reader, with a collection of over 400 books.
But the studios wanted Marilyn Monroe to keep the `dumb blonde’ image forever despite that the fact she was a great comedian as well, Shelley added.
"She (Marilyn) really didn’t believe that she was such a (good) comedian and she was. In Some Like It Hot, she was brilliant. I saw her in Actors Studio where she was brilliant...she read a lot of interesting books about civil rights, politics, and she really got involved in those things. But she didn’t have a support group, she was afraid of people.’’Â
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WITH MY LOOKS... - WEIRDOVERSEWEIRDOVERSE: […] next result offers to inform you: “Why Marilyn Monroe wanted to sleep with Albert Einstein“ These headlines stem from the same source, Shelley Winters, who was roommates with Marilyn […]
From Albert Einstein to the Roswell UFO and with Marilyn Monroe in the Picture Too? | Mysterious Universe – EveryThingStrangeTv Community Site: […] hinted about a dalliance with the genius.” The “genius,” of course, was Einstein. Check out The Canadian Bazaar story, too, for what Shelly Winters said. And at Culturacolectiva.com, we have this: “Marilyn Monroe and Albert Einstein crossed paths […]
From Albert Einstein to the Roswell UFO and with Marilyn Monroe in the Picture Too? – The Controversial Files: […] hinted about a dalliance with the genius.” The “genius,” of course, was Einstein. Check out The Canadian Bazaar story, too, for what Shelly Winters said. And at Culturacolectiva.com, we have this: “Marilyn Monroe and Albert Einstein crossed paths […]
From Albert Einstein to the Roswell UFO and with Marilyn Monroe in the Picture Too? | Mysterious Universe: […] a dalliance with the genius.” The “genius,” of course, was Einstein. Check out The Canadian Bazaar story, too, for what Shelly Winters said. And at Culturacolectiva.com, we have this: “Marilyn Monroe and Albert Einstein crossed paths […] 
