nic mars
As a young boy growing up in California, Nic remembers
that his first musical influences were of listening to his mothers records. "Jimmie Rodgers (Honeycomb, Kisses Sweeter than
Wine) and Ray Charles," Nic recalls. "I couldn't get enough of those two guys. And
talk about complete opposites. Jimmie had this perfect voice with just the right amount of emotion infused, and Ray
was all soul and gutteral delivery. They just took me somewhere else. "Nic elaborates,
"I remember I would come home from school, go to my room and listen to them until dinner time. I should have been outside
playing with my brothers and sister and the rest of the neighborhood kids. I'm quite sure my parents were just a
little bit worried about me."
While Rodgers took some time off from his recording career to recuperate from
a tragic event, Nic shifted his listening ear on over to one of his father's favorite
performers, the raw and captivating sound of Johnny Cash. "I remember the first time I heard Folsom Prison Blues," Nic relates. "I was like 'holy cow!' I was mesmerized. " When Johnny Cash met Bob Dylan, Nic naturally went along for the ride. Nic touts,"It's
hard to be a fan of Americana music and not have a special place in your heart for Bob." Dylan's influence on Nic, like countless other singer/songwriters, is well established. Nic
goes on, "The guy is in a league of his own. Cash knew it. Lennon knew it. Greatness recognizes greatness."
In the fertile musical soils of Southern California Nic
cemented his love for the craft of songwriting. The Grateful Dead, Jackson Browne, the Eagles, James Taylor, Joni Mitchell,
CSN&Y, Neil Diamond and Bill Withers are among a few of the forces influencing Nic at the time. Nic recalls,"When Springsteen came onto the scene it
was unprecedented. The combination of the 60s folk messages and the 70s hard driving rock beats elevated the platform of cause
and effect music to a whole new level, and delivered it to an audience of substantial proportion. It was electric." Nic reminices,"I remember when Bruce came on the stage for the 'No Nukes Benefit Concert' at the
Hollywood Bowl. He set the place on fire doing his Woody Guthrie retro thing. I had never seen one man have such an impact."
Nic started writing songs the moment he could put three chords
together. "It's been a journey of trial and error," Nic explains. "The art form is about
reaching people and widening awarenesses. If you can eek out a living along the way all the better."
Nic is an American songwriter with an uniquely original style
of blending genres. His songs traverse the smokey layers and sparse landscapes of the sub-stratum and forlorn. With one collective
voice he delivers a message that rises from the wheat fields and resonates up through the cracks in the social infrastructure.
He reminds us that we are all the children of the same mother, and she stands in a NYC harbor, raising the torch
of an eternal flame whose light shines to the very corners of this nation.
Nic has trekked throughout the lower forty-eight states and
is comfortable wherever people come together in song. He visits New York City frequently, and says he is both humbled
and charged by a city that at one time or another, nurtured some of this countrys finest songwriters. Nic
currently makes his home in the Litchfield Hills of Connecticut, and says he is often moved by the seeded spirit of New
England.- L J L
