Mark’s Auto-Bio

I was born and raised in Houston, Texas. We moved around a lot, but for the most part I grew up in Third Ward. The youngest of four and my parents are both teachers and I was raised by my Mama. My home life was simple. We did not have much, but I never knew that because for the most part I always had what I needed. I would say that I grew up in isolation for the most part. I was not old enough to hang with the older kids and not young enough to play with the younger kids so I just did my own thing for the most part.

For middle and high school, everyone on my block went to the local middle and high school and I chose to go to school across town. My family moved again and my only real connections with my new friends from middle and high school were over the telephone and events. By the way, I had a happy childhood, but I am giving you my journey so you may have a little more insight on why I am such a goofball. Lol…

So as a child, I had always enjoyed singing and making, what we called back in the day, slow tapes. These slow tapes had the most beautiful love songs. My artist of choice was Luther Vandross. It seemed that, at that time, he consistently created songs that directly related to what I was going through concerning love. I guess you can say those slow tapes would be my first introduction to singing. I actually did not become interested in rapping until later. If you are waiting for me to tell you that I have been singing all of my life; I guess that is a true statement, but not really. I was never a lead vocalist. I sung in the gospel choir, but nothing more than a member of the choir. Not only that, in high school, I was told consistently not to sing because I was that bad…. Lol….In accordance with that, I had been told all of my life that I did not have the talent to sing. Actually, I was not able to hold a decent note or display any real vocal control until after high school. I even became the cadence caller in 1992 while I was in the military. Over time, I would find that, always in some capacity, I was working on music in some way. I was either purchasing equipment for my studio or visiting places where singers hung out.

Oh, let me cover some of the usual suspects meaning some of my influences. I call them the big 5 – Luther Vandross, Gerald Levert, Brian McKnight, Will Downing, and Boyz II Men for R&B. The list is too long to tell you why, but there are so many artists that I enjoy or love their body of work that since I am writing, I feel an obligation to mention. Some of them are R Kelly, Joe, Peabo Bryson, James Ingram, Teddy Pendegrass, Prince, Coming of Age, Dru Hill, Az Yet, Shai, Silk, Atlantic Starr, Earth, Wind, and Fire, Marvin Gaye, Sam Cook, Lou Rawls, Betty Wright, Millie Jackson, Anita Baker, Sade, and I would say those are the big ones that come to mind. I am mostly influenced by male soloists and r&b harmony groups.

As for rap/hip-hop, my influences include 2Pac, Ice-Cube, X-Clan, KRS-One, Public Enemy, Common, Mos Def, Dr. Dre, Rakim, Big Daddy Kane, Scarface and the Geto Boyz, LL Cool J, and Kool Moe Dee. Now those are the big names, buuuuuut there are some honorable mentions in terms of artists that have either created a song or music that influences the way that I look at creating music. Some of the artists include Fat Pat, Big Moe, Lil Keke, ESG, 8 Ball and MJG, Bustdown, Mystikal, Tim Smoothe, 50 Cent, Nas, Jay-Z kinda (long story lol), Yo-Yo, MC Lyte, Salt N’ Pepa, Kid N’ Play, and Z-ro.

My belief is that every artist, whether I have heard one song or their body of work, whether from Midnight Starr to Count Basie to Hillbilly Blues to Thelonious, Coltrane, Sonny Stitt, Sonny Rollins, Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday, Frank Sinatra, to Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, the Motown singers and groups, Stevie Wonder and truthfully the list just goes on and on especially since I listen to a lot of music; I am influenced by all of them and there is an element of every one of them in the music that I create. The nice thing is that… all of those influences make me me…. and if you are trying to figure out what makes my music unique and why should you listen to it over anyone else’s….. Easy. I am me and they are them.  I tell a story and it may or may not resonate with you. That’s it. Music is completely subjective. I wish I had something clever to tell you like I can talk about love better than anyone or I am simply the greatest rapper ever. Well… Those things are only true because the nature of music is subjective. That point is important because as a poet, I want and do talk about everything and not just simply the human social condition. Much longer story… Just listen to my music for the details…lol….