Bio
Mark Dunn Powerhouse New Album
Top Gear Keeps the Rock’N Roll Torch Burning
The Project is Produced by Acclaimed 3-Time Grammy Award-winner Andrew Coleman
A lot has been said about the supposed demise of rock music, especially of the guitar drivenrock variety. For the last two decades or so, rock acts have not been seen on the national TV portion of the Grammy Awards or has it made much of a dent on the popular music charts.
All that has done, however, is to push rock ‘n roll, hard rock and heavy metal underground, making it hip again. The genre is alive and well with the crunch of the music being well-represented at festivals, gigs and on the airwaves all around the country and all over the world.
One such keeper of the flame is guitar ace Mark Dunn, whose talent on the electric guitar is undeniable and well-established. Now, in 2023, Dunn comes out swinging on his brand-new album Top Gear. Filled with original rockers from head to toe, Dunn’s powerful guitar licks are uplifting while at the same wall shaking.
Producing Top Gear is the legendary studio board man, musician and producer Andrew Coleman, who has worked with everyone from Prince, Beyonce’ and Pharrell Williams to Ed Sheeran, Bruno Mars, The Rolling Stones, Snoop Dogg and many more great artists.
A quick search on Grammy.com finds Coleman winning three Grammy Awards over the years along with garnering 13 Grammy Award nominations. Coleman’s last Grammy Award win was for his work on Beck’s Hyperspace album. Before that, his session chops on Kendrick Lamar’s landmark recording To Pimp A Butterfly led to an Album of the Year Grammy Award.
On this new release by Dunn, Coleman not only brings his high-end studio knowledge to the project, he also co-writes every song on the recording with Dunn while adding his talents on the keyboards to three out of the eight cuts.
Front and center on Top Gear, however, is Dunn’s amazing guitar prowess, Moog synthesizer skills and lead vocals. An artful performer with both the electric guitar as well as the acoustic six-string, Dunn combines superbly layered, rhythm riffs with lead guitar explosiveness that leaves few stones left unturned. His love for hard rock music is unabashed, yet his playing is not flashy for the sake of it. Dunn has been around the block a time or two in the music business, and his appreciation for all things rock ‘n roll is obvious, real and essential yet not gimmicky or gratuitous.
The rhythm section providing the solid bottom on Top Gear includes bassist Ross King, drummer Tripp Johnson, Jesse Willoughby also on bass, and the back-up vocalist ‘choir’ featuring Jesse Chong, Sherri Linn, and Krissy Sieber.
Although Dunn has spent time in the Nashville and Atlanta music scenes, winning the Georgia Country Music Association Musician of the Year Award along the way, he continues to be based in his home turf of Virginia Beach, VA. When his mother took him to see the late Stevie Ray Vaughan perform when he was a kid, it turned his head around, as did the music of the great Eddie Van Halen. Eventually, Dunn’s older brother handed him his first electric guitar and hewould soon be playing professional gigs by the time he was a teenager.
On Top Gear, a follow-up to his well-received Lyrics, Licks and Lovers album, Dunn stakes his claim as a torchbearer for the hard rock genre.
Derek Halsey - Award winning Journalist/Biographer