Raunch ’n’ rollers
Mark Inside were Whitby misfits Band’s live show a polished effort
High school is pretty awful to begin with, but imagine running out your teenage years in Whitby during mainstream rock’s double-barrelled plunge into the twin nadirs of nu- metal and mall- punk at the dawn of this century. So many backwards ballcaps, so many Sevendust T- shirts, so many angry young men fixating on Fred Durst as a role model.
Fortunately, the four likeable lads who compose scruffy local raunch ’ n’ roll outfit the Mark Inside seem to have escaped the shared context of their upbringings unscathed, even if they’ve traded the outsider status they shared in high school for a different sort of doesn’t- quite- fitanywhere “ otherness” in downtown Toronto’s cliquey indierock underground. Former schoolmates brought together by “ boredom and pot” and a collective admiration for such Canadian indie stalwarts as Thrush Hermit, Tricky Woo and the Deadly Snakes, the Mark Inside was born in early 2000 from the splintering of two separate groups that crossed paths — as bassist/ guitarist Geoff Bennett puts it — while “ playing sh--- y band wars around Durham.”
Bennett and singer/guitarist Chris Levoir, who’ve known each other since they were 8, still fondly recall the moment they knew they were destined to form a band with Gus Harris and Geordie Dynes.
“ Their opening tune was a cover of ‘ Ice Ice Baby’ by Vanilla Ice and Gus was the bassist, so we were, like, we’ve gotta get these guys,” laughs Bennett. Through lengthy jam sessions in Dynes’s parents’ basement, the foursome polished the daunting live show that remains its strength. The sound is a hard- to- pin- down storm of scuffed-up garage-rock, wayward ’ 60s psychedelia, Zeppelinesque blooze and assaultive, Sonic Youth- ian noise, branding the Mark Inside as an anomaly on the 905 all- ages circuit.
“ We totally didn’t fit in with the rest of our high school,” says Levoir. “ They were all playing in sh--- y Limp Bizkit bands, trying to be, like, ‘ I’m badder than you.’ We were just a bunch of potheads in the corner of the library.
“ Everybody else was listening to skate-punk and any highschool party we went to or anything it was either hip- hop dance tracks playing or Blink 182 or Millencolin or something like that . . . We literally didn’t know anybody else who was into anything that we were into until we started going to (Oshawa live- music spot) Dungeon shows and met, like, the Cuff the Duke guys and the Failures.”
Bennett: “ When we moved to Toronto, we didn’t want to be indie heroes or stars of Wavelength or anything. It was just to keep playing. We didn’t want to be hobnobbing it up.”
“ We wanted the respect of the people we’ve always had respect for,” adds Levoir.
Vindication has come through the Mark’s embrace by two of its forebears: Former Carnation and current Ladies & Gentlemen mastermind Thom D’Arcy — who produced several tracks on the band’s self- released debut, Static/ Crash — and, more recently, much- loved indie producer Ian Blurton. The latter was drafted to remix Static/ Crash
when it was picked up for nationwide release by MapleMusic this summer, and is obviously fond enough of the Mark Inside to consistently recruit the quartet as C’mon’s touring partner. “We pretty much became a metal band when we toured with them,” says Dynes. His rough- hewn influence will likely be felt on the next Mark Inside album, the demos for which, says Bennett, feature “ one of the loudest songs we’ve ever done next to one of the quietest songs we’ve ever done.” The band is understandably anxious to get something new out there next year, since the songs on Static/Crash are a somewhat outdated picture of the Mark’s toughening, more distinct present- day sound.
“ It was literally just us having the songs ready to record at whatever day and actually having the money to record whatever songs we had ready, so it was kind of a mishmash,” says Levoir. “ We recorded it with a couple of different people and we got some free recording time because I was going to the Harris Institute and we got five songs recorded for free as part of somebody’s student project there . . . Three- quarters of the record hasn’t been in our set now for a good two years, so we’ve been ready to move on for a long time now.” Just the facts Who: The Mark Inside, as part of Nu Music Nite’s 12th anniversary with the Illuminati, Priestess and Stuey & the Cowtones Where: The Horseshoe Tavern, 370 Queen St. W. When: Tuesday @ 9:30 p.m. Cover: Free