Mark Fullmer - writer, musician, flaneur

Leave The Light On (Priscilla Ahn cover)

Mark Fullmer — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:33:05 +0000

Agnus Dei

Mark Fullmer — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 00:41:14 +0000

In a fit of procrastination, I dug through my old audio archives. What I found was a brief snippet of a 16th century "Agnus Dei" setting in three voices. I'd recorded it on trumpet and promptly forgotten about it. But see, one part multitrack mixer and two parts procrastination can lead to good--well, decide for yourself. But here's what I did:

Part 1: The unedited, virgin version.

Part 2: Track doubled. First track: 78% reverb, 10% wet mix, 25% pan left. Second track dropped down the octave, 25% pan right.

Part 3: Track doubled. First track: .63 delay, 30% modulation w/ -100% spread. 2nd track dropped down the octave, 2.5 delay, 70& modulation w/ 0% spread.

Part 4: Track tripled. First track as is. Second track raised 1 step. Third track lowered 1 step.

Part 5: Track tripled. First track digitally delayed w/ 60% ping-pong. Second track manually delayed 1 second & digitally delayed 750 milliseconds with 36% feedback & 62% wet mix. Third track manually delayed 2 seconds.

Bleecker Street

Mark Fullmer — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 18:40:37 +0000

A couple weeks back, as I sat transcribing the lyrics for "Beijing Huan Ying Ni," my mp3 player got stuck on "Bleecker Street," a Simon & Garf. number from their pre folk-rock phase (and did you know folk-rock wasn't even really their idea?). Well techically, I got my mp3 player stuck on it, but the point is I found a new appreciation for the song's simple intricacy. The counterpoint melodies weaving back and forth above and below each other. The subdominant-to-mediant suspensions. Funny how it doesn't sound nearly as nice when you put it into technical terms. Anyway. I figured I could write something like that. So I did, recorded it, listened to it, and promptly concluded that I liked the original song far better. Thus this cover, borned.

Woman With Knife No. 5

Mark Fullmer — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 23:11:51 +0000

Pastel and India ink on canvas, with aluminum foil. (2006). Created as a prop for the Olive Barrel Productions short film by the same name.

Across the Universe

Mark Fullmer — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 18:07:00 +0000

Composed for and broadcast on the A Mutual Respect February Music Month Challenge

Context: Yep, second time this month I broke my promise not to do covers, but if the first time (“Vespers”) was well worth it, this time…well let’s just say I have reasons which will become evident on March 18th (cue mysterious Mark laugh).

On the music: I started with a concept – since I’m without access to (or competency at) percussion, why not use *rain* to provide the rhythm for a song? I’ve always had a thing for rain. I layered it in, after recording the synthesizer and vocals, and that concept led to the other ‘atmospheric’ FX. Perhaps the effect comes across as heavy-handed, given the lyrics, but hey, take it up with John Lennon if you got a problem.

北京欢迎你

Mark Fullmer — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 16:51:27 +0000

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Composed for and broadcast on the A Mutual Respect February Music Month Challenge

I’ll be leaving for 中国 in 六月 for 二 years to serve in the Peace Corps. So. There you go.

The song title translates as “Beijing welcomes you,” and I think this is sort of the Chinese equivalent of “It’s a Small World.” It was composed for the 2008 Olympics and famously sung by 100 of China’s biggest celebrities, including Wang Lee Hom, Zhou Bichang, Karen Mok, Jang Nara, Li Yuchun, Zhang Zilin and yes, Jackie Chan. Apparently everyone in China knows it. It’s a catchy tune and good Mandarin practice, and I like to think of the lyrics as a good omen for my journey.

Po' Man's Blues

Mark Fullmer — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 17:34:53 +0000

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Composed for and broadcast on the A Mutual Respect February Music Month Challenge

The musical inspiration for “Po. Man’s Blues” came mostly from The Beatles’ “Dizzy Miss Lizzy”, with a dash of Sammy Davis Jr’s version of “Have a Little Talk with Myself”. Personally, the most enjoyable part of recording the thing was laying down the bass line. I would’ve thrown in a few rockabilly screams but I really didn’t want to concern my landlord who was next door painting. The lyrics began with trying to figure out how to avoid a mess of tired similes and the concept just got worse from there:

I’ve got another tired simile
It’s like a barren tree
I’ve got another tired simile
It’s like a dried up sea
Oh why, oh why can’t somebody put me out of my misery

Why doesn’t nothing rhyme with orange,
The closest I’ve come is ‘Mormons’
Why doesn’t nothing rhyme with orange
The next closest word is porridge
Oh my, oh my it’s like tryin to rhyme the color purple

I need one more line for my stanza
It’s bout an alien extravaganza
I need one more line for my stanza
…
Oh why, oh why …

I’ve got too many frickin syllables
To make my poem chug along
I’ve got too many frickin syllables
What I need to say is just to long
Well my words are too big because I’ve got to much to say
Something’s got to give I guess I should write an essay
Oh my, oh my I’ve got too many fricking syllables

I’ve got the po man’s blues
My poetry is blue
I’ve got the po man’s blues
I’m done for through and through
Oh my oh my oh my I’ve got the po man’s blues

The Crusades

Mark Fullmer — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:33:25 +0000

Composed for and broadcast on the A Mutual Respect February Music Month Challenge

Ever since I was a kid, I always wondered what a David Lynch film about the Dalai Lama would be like. This is my musical realisation of that film.

I suppose the composition also has a personal meaning, as it imbricates three spiritualities I’ve dabbled with (in?) over the years.

The texts:
“Nam myoho renge kyoho” — Nichiren

“Door of my heart open wide I keep for thee” — Paramahansa Yogananda

“Dona nobis pacem” — Latin liturgy

Rebecca True & Charlie Kind

Mark Fullmer — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 16:58:30 +0000

Composed for and broadcast on the A Mutual Respect February Music Month Challenge

Context: I was driving home from this sushi place-–I don’t know, probably the only one in town--and I had my radio on the local NPR. Really local, if you know what I mean. It was Mexico music hour, apparently, and I fell in love instantly. Playing was one of those slow ballads with the guitarron plucking away at a lullaby walking bass. It really transported me, I mean really. That’s where the feeling for my song came from, anyway. The kernel of the lyrics came next, and then a rough version of the melody, which straightened itself out as I figured out the precise words. Having completed the song, I really like how the melody makes use of a single note, G-sharp, first functioning as the major 7th of the A chord, then as the 3rd of the E, and then as the added (and raised!) 4th of the D in the chorus. Listen when you’re in the mood for nap time.

Lyrics:

In fourth grade math
In august sunshine
In a town of angels
They sat knee to knee

They shared a lunchbag
They played piano
They traded moonbeams
All in angelic memory

Rebecca True
Charlie Kind
Their names carved in a wooden sea
They caught the lamplight before it shined out
Lost in a childhood melody

On the playing field
On August third
On wings of childhood
He hit a moonbeam just for her

Within a diary
Within a tree house
Within a moonbeam
She cried a tulip just for him

Before seven summers
Before seven skylines
Before seven angels
Rebecca turned into a tree

And he town of angels
And the august moonbeams
And Charlie True
Thanked god for gotten memory

A meme for writers

Mark Fullmer — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 20:02:43 +0000

Note: questions posed by fellow writer and friend, Danielle, in preparation for a faculty reading series.

1. What was the first short story, poem or other work you wrote (and I mean the first—go back to childhood days!)
I mostly drew pictures early on, but see below (circa age 8):

2. Do you have any writing rituals or routines that you generally follow?
The long version is Mark’s 10-step program for writing a chapter. But for brevity’s sake, I’ll share one indispensable ritual. After all the drafts, after all the polishing, when I feel the writing is gleaming and I’m starting to think I’m the most brilliant prosodist since whomever and am ready for the bowing down stuff and shrines in my honor, I record an audio version of the piece. Then I listen and revise. This of course helps highlight bad sentences that seemed good in my head, plus the few typos that lurk like socks in a dryer without Cling-Free, and it reminds me that it’s a bit early for the shrines. But more importantly, it gives me a sense of the music of writing—it’s the best technique for self-teaching craft I know.

Also: it helps to shack up for a couple months in a one-room shack in the middle of like, New Mexico or somewhere.

3. Do you have an imagined reader that is an actual or fictitious person?
When I compose, an ideal reader is always present, but always mutating--(as I write this, there's an audience of college students at a faculty reading series listening in my brain)--usually an amalgam of a few close friends (writers and non-writers alike) who I can name but won’t and this weird superego father-figure writer-mentor person thing. The first group keeps me in touch with what needs to be said and how, and the second, the superego thing, reminds me my writing is never good enough.

4. Which writers do you turn to for inspiration?
I have a few I turn to and return to, but they’re too maudlin, dated, or pulp-fictioney to mention. A better answer is this: just yesterday I was trying to get some purchase on my novel’s ending, so I walked to the public library and grabbed three books almost at random (Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, Philip K. Dick’s Ubik, and a biography on D.H. Lawrence) and read only the last chapters of each. I left the library with more inspiration than I could handle.

5. Are there any writers to whom you would hope NOT to be compared?
I think most writers don’t particularly like being compared to any author, because either you disagree with the comparison or it makes you feel like people think you’re some derivative hack without anything original. Then again, I can think of half a dozen writers at whose comparison I would pretty much wet my pants out of delight.

6. Would you accept or decline an Oprah selection?
Accept, on the condition that I don’t have to go on the show. I’d be a bumbling fool. With the possible exception of Norman Mailer, writers should not be public figures.

7. Be honest: “Rich and famous now" or “Unknown now and highly acclaimed for generations to come?"
Neither. If I were famous now for my writing, I’d feel full of inhibitions and expectations and probably wouldn’t be able to write a goddam thing. Or at least I wouldn’t enjoy it. As for the ‘highly acclaimed for generations’ junk, I could care less. Cause I’d be dead.

8. What advice do you give aspiring writers?
Don’t do it for the wrong reasons. To be precise: be an aspiring writer only if the act of writing for long hours is a compulsion akin to the needle for the smack junkie.

9. If you could have written any famous literary work, which one would it be?
Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral.” Every syllable is perfect.

10. In a coffee shop full of writers, how would someone be able to spot you?
Eeks. I’d never be in a coffee shop full of writers. It’d be horribly intimidating.

11. At what point in the writing process do you seek input from a friend, peer, or writing group?
Only after I’ve done a fairly solid polish of a second draft (meaning: I know what I want to say and have pretty well represented how I’m gonna say it). Peers shouldn’t be expected to give you ideas for substance or style. They should see what you’re going for and help you get there. And they’re great for catching any glaring inconsistencies.

12. What question about writing should I have asked, and how would you have answered it?
Question: Why do you write?

Answer: I don’t know. I could do without it I suppose, which ain’t what Stephen King’ll tell you. It’s not because I have this great understanding of humanity to imbue in readers—I know I don’t. It’s not that I want people to ‘understand’ me or that I want to ‘express my inner shit’ or whatever. I guess the best thing I can say is it’s satisfying, like I imagine building your own house might be, or even just baking a chocolate cake. Yeah, writing’s like a chocolate cake.