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Mark Gloster And Big Rubber Shark

About Me

Mark Gloster and Big Rubber Shark is the musical vehicle for the writing and performance of Mark Gloster and a small cluster of friends. Occasionally the Rubber Shark Band (auxiliary) performs as a 50's-2000's cover band. Mark also performs a wild mixture of acoustic originals and covers in Rubber Shark Gumbo with the wonderful, funny, charming and talented Patrick J. Cooper

We kind of have a rubber shark theme going here.

Mark ascended from the primordial ooze area the dinosaurs knew as "Grrrr, Thptht!", which is really hard to say without lips, and the western reaches of el gran lavabo, or giant toilet- oh, sorry, that's Great Basin. As the earth cooled and most vegetation turned to sage brush, the young person found that he had to defend himself from dinosaurs by using clever verses he composed to confound them- I know what you're thinking- "walnut-sized brain," but consider the big teeth! Fast forward through that awkward Triassic and Jurassic youth, he then had to ward off lounge singers with the heaviest guitar he could find. Sadly, their violent echoes of schlocky music haunted him until he taught Neil Young that third chord and that was history for Neil. Our "sharkboy" was left in relative obscurity until someone unlocked the sub basement.

After experiencing unrewarding collaborative musical efforts with others in the early years, the only answer became clear to write music in relative solitude and begin singing and recording. Gradually, assisted by a small network of musical friends, a project began to take shape, and that shape was extremely shark-like. 1996 culminated, if a year can do that, in the release of _Monday's Lunch_, the album and the song of the same name. The album was a word of mouth success, but lacking the energy and full band and time to market it, many copies stayed on the shelf. They say that only a small number of people bought the Velvet Underground's first CD, but all of those people went out and started their own bands from the powerful influence. The story is similar for the CD, _Monday's Lunch_, as almost everybody who heard it started a band immediately after to just get that sound out of their heads. An earworm, like, oh, say THE CANDYMAN. Sorry.

The Glass Flesh, Robyn Hitchcock Tribute effort has seen some of Mark's contributions, as well as some by friends. Hopefully the next one will include more of that.

Over the past few years Mark has been cajoled, nudged and shrieked at by complete strangers. Well, haven't we all? But some of those strangers have suggested that this music become available again and that this magical artistic vehicle assert once again ginormous presence in the existential freeway of mass culture, since it is violent, reckless and moves a bit too fast.

As soon as is possible, the CD's will become available via normal channels. If you can't live without this material, you may contact Mark at this page. $10 shipped isn't a bad deal. Trust us. We know stuff like that. Have we ever lied to you?

Mark spends some of the time working on and designing (mostly cookbook) guitar amplifiers.

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 17/02/2007
Band Website: This will do for the moment
Band Members: Me and a revolving/evolving cast of spectacular people. Okay, some of them are evolving. None at a really fast rate, but I'll let you know.
Influences:

I have just started listening to Jonathan Coulton and Roy Zimmerman - what a breath of fresh air! After finding Ze Frank's video blog “ The Show ,” I have watched every episode at least twice.


The biggies for me are King Crimson , Stan Ridgway , Robyn Hitchcock , Frank Zappa , ([the Mystic Knights of the] Oingo) Boingo, Mark Knopfler, They Might Be Giants , Steve Tibbetts, TalkingHeads, Devo, Dan Bern, Negativland, Peter Gabriel, Green Day, Trini Lopez, The Turtles, Paul Revere and the Raiders, Tao Chemical, World Entertainment War, various prog and punk acts. I go through spurts of listening to classic rock.


I'm profoundly influenced by musicians I play with and have played with: Patrick J. Cooper , Dave Brown, Karen Stern, Tony Khalife, Jeffrey Wash . If you don't like my music, please assume no guilt toward them for the association.


Media: Older Vonnegut and H.S. Thompson. Monty Python, Peter Cook, Firesign Theater, Bob Newhart, Rob Breszny. I try to stay away from TV, but I can't help loving the Simpsons, Family Guy, Aqua Teen Hunger Force and The Tick (animated series.) And where would we be without The Daily Show, Stephen Colbert and Keith Olbermann? Most of the time I use things like the above to clean the residue of popular culture out of my system. I'm hoping that the stuff I write has that effect for others.


Rickenbacker guitars (they don't pay people for saying nice things about them- if they did, I'd be bloody rich!) have become a bit of an influence and a passion for me.


I am more influenced by crackpots outside the major media than by suits and heads inside it.


Sounds Like: Hmmm, what am I supposed to say here? An aerosol cheese brain enema?
Record Label: Tigermonkey
Type of Label: Indie

My Blog

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