Band : Mark Lotterman
Album title : Better Things To Do
Label : Tocada Records
Distributor : Sonic Rendezvous
Release date : 28/03/2009
Release : CD

This modern troubadour started his musical career in 2001, touring with famous Dutch Beat-poet Simon Vinkenoog (a one-time close friend of Ginsberg). The band would play, the poet would recite his works. That engagement ended in 2005, Lotterman moved to Amsterdam and started composing the songs which would eventually end up on his solo debut Pain & Entertainment, released late 2007. In between, he and his band would of course play several gigs all around Holland, and it’s at one of those gigs that a friendship with American Freak Roots master Johnny Dowd was begun (Dowd is known to have called Mark and his band “the greatest Rock ‘n’ Roll band I’ve heard in years. Several gigs were played in support of Dowd, and Mark has even joined Dowd on stage as additional guitar player). Motterman ended up writing a drum and bass song, played as duet with Dowd, and featured on said album. Following the release of his debut album, Lotterman again moved, this time to a small village near Rotterdam called Mijnsheerenland, where he set about writing the songs for his second album (released in Holland in late March, and now sent to us for review).

Lotterman’s songs are stylistically varied, using elements of Folk, Country, Blues, Rock(abilly), and even Ska depending on his song’s needs. Calmer moments/ songs alternate with more passionate ones, the keyboards can either go piano-style or organ, the guitar(s) from acoustic to deep Bluesey Hard Rock…the vocals from actually singing, to spoken word! During the recordings of the album, several artists (Sjors Nederhof of theStrikes and Coup De Grace, Eelke Mastenbroek, Ferry Lagendijk of Boris and Alain Clark, and eventually also Antwerp based gypsy orchestra Ambrassband) joined Lotterman in the studio for a guest performance, showing their appreciation for his work. As a singer, Lotterman has a nice bass in the morre uptempo songs, which shows itself a deep bariton in the calmer, almost spoken-word tracks. Aaahhh…I could go on trying to give you a description of this versatile modern poet, but I think it’s simply best to mention the man’s influences…(as listed on his MySpace page) Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Johnny Dowd, Lou Reed, Tom Waits, Neil Young, Leonard Cohen, Arthus Ebeling, Daniel Johnston, Eril Satie, Jim White…and hope you’ll understand that Motterman’s work can be situated within that bulk of variety, and beyond!

I guess in the end, the only way to get what this guy is about, is to listen to the tracks posted at myspace.com/marlotterman (5 tracks off the new album, one off the debut)…although to get a full picture one would need to listen to the album as a whole, time and again! Nice, real nice…!

90/100

Tony.