Mark Mallman tells stories. Long ones, sometimes lasting a day or two without taking a break. Back in 1999 he performed one song non-stop for over 26 hours. He beat his own record in September 2004 by performing over 52 hours and 600 pages of lyrics. Unfortunately neither event has been acknowledged by the Guinness Book of Records due to hazy guidelines on what constitutes a song. Fortunately, Mark Mallman also records his songs; the kind that you may have heard on the radio back in 1978 or on vinyl before the shiny discs every made it to planet earth.

Hailing from Milwaukee and transplanted to Minneapolis in 1991, Mallman was trained as a classical pianist since he was a child. On his latest pop masterpiece and his fifth full-length studio album, Between the Devil and Middle C, Mallman brews seventies and eighties pop and pours them into a caffeinated power energy drink that encourages guzzling straight from the bottle. The album mixes intense piano-driven ballads with fiery pop and has the energy which recalls another madman pianist but from across the water.

The songs are an eerie mixture of sweet pop, inflamed with lyrics usually about hangovers, drinking wine, going to shows and getting high. Lyrics slip through Mallman’s clenched teeth as if the words are churned through a meat grinder. His grinding vocals recall the unique styling of T Bone Burnett blended with the sounds of T Rex. “Substances” finds the singer looking for something deeper to life but all he can find is addictive substance and evokes the keyboards of Gary Numan. “Turn On of the Century” incorporates most of the album’s themes into one tasty sugar-coated candy bar and contains the album’s title. “Death Wish” deals with suspicions and mistrust as Mallman spits out one-line fragments that gently fly off the pages of his sketchbook. “16 Animals” leads off with synthesizers that sound like “Pop Music” by M, and quickly transcends into a accelerated comet. “Tell Me How a Man Gets Close to You” is a romantic pop sing-along about long distance, yet auspicious relationship. Throughout the album Mallman knits together what appears to be random, incoherent and whacked-out thoughts into a tightly woven, warm, fuzzy sweater perfect for cool nights in the Twin Cities.

Freebies Substances and Death Wish
But I suggest downloading the entire album at emusic.