Mark Ciani
“Some Kind Of Purgatory”
Directed by Mike Kundrath
HIP Video Productions
Added 12/10/2024
About Mark Ciani
“No, I’m not gonna break,” Mark Ciani insists in the first moments of “Some Kind of Purgatory,” his latest single. The NYC based artist sounds resolute — like a man who refuses to lose. At the same time, his voice betrays the sentiment, with a display of great emotional strain. What’s driven this narrator to the edge of the cliff? Over the next three minutes of adventurous, experimental, fearless art-rock, he lays it out for fans and does so in language that is simultaneously frank, vivid, funny, and desperate. Ciani’s main character may be trapped in limbo, but he hasn’t settled into that middle ground comfortably. It’s the resolution he’s after, and as far as he is from it, he’ll get there one way or another.
About “Some Kind Of Purgatory”
Drama, urgency, humor, surprise: it’s all there in Ciani’s music. The dedicated listeners who are thrilled about the storytelling on the 2022 album King of Death and its sequel King of Death Returns and the darker ironies of the recent full-length Sad Robot will recognize the hallmarks of Ciani’s writing. The rocker is a sure hand with misdirection and revealing detail; he knows exactly how to bring a character alive and how to fill a song to its corners with charisma and intrigue. On his upcoming set , he’s once again joining forces with the multiple Grammy-winning producer and engineer Fernando Lodeiro, who has helped songwriters as adventurous as Paul McCartney, Esperanza Spalding, and The Vampire Weekend create sonic settings for their compositions. On “Some Kind of Purgatory,” Ciani and Lodeiro appoint the track with rubbery bass, ringing piano chords, synthesizer, and a shuddering, danceable beat that falls apart and reconstitutes itself like an unstoppable monster. Everything about the verses is designed to highlight the instability of the narrator. But when Ciani arrives at the choruses, it’s pure singalong bliss.
About “Some Kind Of Purgatory” Lyric Video
A song so thoughtfully written demands a close examination of its lyrics. Mark Ciani has always taken great care with his words, and that’s even true when it sounds like he’s losing control. Mike Kundrath’s lyric clip for “Some Kind of Purgatory” amplifies both the verses’ tension and the chorus’s soaring release. The director juxtaposes images of frayed ropes, televisions on the fritz, and the ghostly blue light of cellphones with flocks of birds ascending toward the heavens. But pointedly, those skies aren’t perfectly blue. They’re covered in clouds. The audience can aspire to wriggle out of the traps they’ve set for themselves, and sometimes it can feel like they’re making progress. There’s good entertainment value in watching that progress unfold. But they’ve still got a long way to go.