Lead vocals and rhythm guitar.

"So you want to hear my life story, eh? Well, there you go buddy:

The music-bug had bit me at the early age of three and I was mesmerized by The King Elvis Presley. I even had one of them jumpsuits! From that age on I started to sing along with every Elvis record I bought. I didn't know what the hell I was singing, but I was singing none the less.

By the time I was nine years old, my dad bought me my first guitar and arranged for some lessons. I wound up studying classical and jazz-type stuff for about six years, go figure.

Ralph and I first hit the stage when I was twelve. At first we both sang and played guitar, but shortly after I discovered the keyboard. When synched with a drum computer, we actually sounded like a real band! At least, we thought so…

Anyway, when I got into high school I forgot all about Elvis (for a couple of years anyway) and really turned my head to the blues. Both delta blues and psychedelic sixties blues, by bands like Ten Years After. I guess a restless mind, body and soul makes one turn to music like that. When there happened to be a drummer in one of my classes (I guess we're talking 1992 here folks), we immediately decided to form a band. Him on drums, Ralph on guitar and I dropped both keyboard and guitar in favor of the bass guitar. As a trio we concocted our own brand of psychedelic-punk-blues. This was also the first time we played some of our own self-penned material on stage. After about a year and a half, we came across this bass player who wanted to join us. That was fine by me, because I actually preferred playing the guitar. However, due to some differences in "creative direction", we were left drummer-less a month before our first ever big gig. In a heartbeat I decided to get my butt behind the drums and teach myself to play. It actually worked. I was no Kenny Aronoff or anything but for the time being, I was more than adequate. Actually played the drums for six damn years!

With everything in place now, we actually managed to make a name for ourselves along the way. Even picked up a couple of band-contest-like-awards… 1999 was going to be our year. We had changed our musical direction from the blues to more modern rock (well, sort of…) and had written some great songs (well, sort of…) for what was going to be our first album. However, when we got to recording the songs in the studio, I couldn't deliver the solid drumtracks that we desperately needed. So…I fired myself.

We had a couple of auditions and finally a drummer surfaced that knew how to hold a set of sticks properly… This guy was hired!!! Trying to get the band back on track as a foursome turned out to be a challenge. The new creative direction had left us with an almost non-existent fanbase and I am sad to say we played our share of empty clubs. Perhaps the most frustrating thing was: Ralph and I were also two of the founding members of an Elvis-tribute-band, which successfully toured the country and played huge festivals, while our only "serious" band was playing dives with unappreciative audiences. After nearly two more years of struggling, I simply gave up.

This actually gave me the opportunity to reflect on what I had been doing for the past decade and where I was going, or better yet: where I wanted to go. The only thing I really wanted to do is make "THE ALBUM". You know, the one where you say "this is it, this is the best I got".

This is when the idea of Mufkin Tass was born.

It's funny, if you don't have a band to write songs for, your compositions tend to get more diverse. You know, you don't have to keep the band's "image" or whatever in mind. Also the way we tend to play our songs is more "out there" than it used to be. Working with Kenny Aronoff and Jerry Scheff has taught me that. (Pop)music shouldn't be just about the lead vocal, the entire accompaniment should be exciting as well. Otherwise you'll sound like any other band or artist.

Cool thing about crossing paths with Erwin and Sjoerd is, that they feel the same way about that. Why just play "dum-dum-dum-dum" if you can play something far more melodic and exciting and still keep the song in mind? Anyway, just browse around the website and you'll get what I'm trying to say. Peace."

Mark.