Mark Collie

"THE EARLIEST people that helped to invent rock 'n' roll and create whatever It may have gotten to today – people like Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins and the people who made some of the earliest recordings – that's the first fusion of American white and black and blue cultures," states MCA recording artist Mark Collie as he sits in a ratty, too small dressing room of New York City's Ritz theater preparing to play songs from his third LP, simply titled Mark Collie, in his first opening gig for his childhood idol Johnny Cash. "As a kid, I remember hearing Ray Charles's 'You Don't Know Me', and I dreamed of being Johnny Cash or doing what Johnny Cash was able to do – communicate with a song, with music."