This album started out as nothing more than a desire to release a single from my 2007 album Duchess 33. I had chosen the song "Perverse", recruited a few remixers, and I was on my way. Or, so I thought!

When I went to do a remix of "Perverse" I... I dunno. I guess I didn't feel like it? So I started working on other stuff. I needed to update a couple of Cosmicity songs to bring into my live show, so I started playing with those. That made me contemplate doing a little 4 song EP of reworked Cosmicity songs.

But then when I went to work on updating more Cosmicity tracks... I dunno... I guess I didn't feel like it? So I started working on still other stuff.
I thought a cover song would be cool for my live show, so I made this funny extended ending for the song "Green" which included a verse and chorus from the song "California Love" by Tupac and Dr. Dre. Then I thought maybe I'd do a whole bunch of cover songs for an EP.

But then when I went to do a bunch of other cover songs... I dunno... I guess I didn't feel like it? So I went back to working on a remix of the very popular "Duchess 33" song "Two Sandwiches" to include on the eventual "Perverse" single that I KNEW I'd eventually get around to finishing.

But I totally didn't finish the "Perverse" single. Most of the remixers I'd tapped got busy on other projects and I, well, I dunno. I guess I didn't feel like it?

Finally, lightening struck me. I was scorched and black and smelly and I realized I was never gonna get anything done if I kept trying to push myself into projects I didn't really want to do on a large scale. But if I did a little bit of everything, I could probably get a whole ALBUM worth of material together in a flash. And I absolutely did.

"Perversions" really happened in a matter of months (mostly late summer and early fall '07), while pulling from ideas I was messing around with earlier in that year. The final product has something for absolutely every Mark Nicholas fan... Cosmicity fan... and, why not... every electronic music fan and... yeah, I'm gonna go there... fans of every genre of music throughout the universe. :-)

"Green California" is indeed that funny extended live version of "Green" I was talking about, with me "gangsta" rapping and everything! "Maniac" is a full-length cover of the famous song from the 1980's film "Flashdance" that I created for my final live show (performed at a little bar called Smalls in Detroit). I love this song, despite that show turning out to be the emotional low point of my year. I wrote and recorded it before that emotional crash, and I think you can hear how much fun I was having recording it (even though, for whatever reason, I didn't really get to share it live. I'm just gonna go ahead and say: completely wrong audience.)

But I think the very best part of the album may be where it slows down. "Little Goth Girl (Ethereal Mix)" completely transforms from a screamy thumper in its original form, into a moody I-don't-know-what on this album. I love it. And that may go double for "Selective Memory Loss (Pure and Simple Mix)". Then ya add in the only track I wrote from scratch for this album, "Goodnight My Love", a story told by a voice (man? super computer?) explaining to a sleeping woman why he has to murder her in order to save them both - and murder her he does! Despite the edgy lyrical content, I think the vibe of this song sits really nicely with the ones that precede it, and I often find myself listening to these 3 tracks like they're their own EP.

But I definitely like all of the songs on this album. I DID finally figure out why I didn't want to remix "Perverse". I remembered that I'd done about 4 versions of that song over the course of many months in 2006 before I finally settled on the album mix. Turns out I was just sick of working on it! So here you'll find what I'm calling the "Original Demo" version - even though there were many early versions - which, after I punched it up a little bit, could prove to be even stronger than the version that ended up on "Duchess 33". I guess that's what I get for over-thinking it in the first place. (And Syrian's remix of that same track cooks! Hooray for Syrian delivering a remix when they promise one!) And I pulled a similar bring-it-back-from-the-archives stunt with "The Measure of Pleasure (Sad Bastard Mix)". Truth be told, that's how I had originally finished that song. But when I heard it together with the other tracks on "Duchess 33", it sounded wrong (too sad, too slow) and I reworked it into a faster track for the final release. But for "Perversions" I cleaned it up and brought it back in its original deeply depressing form. Yay depression!!!

The Cosmicity remakes - a new mix of "Your Beautiful Lie" and my wife's mashup of Cosmicity's I Want You with the Duchess 33 track "I Wish" - both came out awesome. Cosmicity fans who weren't too sure about this new sound of mine should be psyched about these.

And finally, "Coming Clean (Club Mix)" and "Two Sandwiches (Detroit Mix)" both give club-goers a little something to bounce to. Oh, and what's with that 8-Bit mix of "Backlash"? Hey, what can I say? I always wanted to have a song in one of those old Nintendo games, and "Backlash" seemed like the right kind of song to translate into that style. Here's hoping it makes you smile and remember fondly all of those times you skipped 8 levels in Super Mario Bros. using the warp zones and felt really cool 'cause you practically beat the whole game in 5 minutes. ;-)