Since 1985 I have released five albums of original songs under the name Last Man Down or as Ross Mullins and the Snaps. For my sixth album, I have set to music some classic New Zealand lyric poetry - mainly (but not exclusively) love poems. As far as I know no-one has devoted a whole album to interpretations of poetry in New Zealand (at least not in popular music). My models for the project were drawn from France where poets such as Prévert, Apollinaire, Aragon, Baudelaire, Rimbaud and Verlaine have been successfully adapted. The only comparable New Zealand recording is the 1999 Baxter project masterminded by Charlotte Yates but this was a  compilation involving twelve different artists. Those who have followed my work should not find this album vastly different from my previous recordings. I have treated these poems as I would my own songs and in an effort to make them accessible, I have in some cases drawn key lines from them to create choruses. I have endeavoured not to alter the texts and what liberties I have taken have met with the approval of the authors or literary executors. My interest in setting poetry to music dates back to my first record State House Kid which included an arrangement of James K. Baxter’s The Bay.  The poets whose work I have chosen represent a bygone era -  Robin Hyde died tragically in 1939, Fairburn and Baxter in 1957 and 1972 respectively. Only Alistair Te Ariki Campbell and Ruth Gilbert are still alive at the time of writing. I certainly did not set out to exclude more contemporary poets but basing my choice on how the poems would work as songs, I found myself drawn to the even stanzas and strong lyrical mood of the poems included here.  Had time allowed, this album could have included work by many other poets whom I admire greatly. Perhaps one day there will be a second volume... Featured on Tidemarks is leading songstress Caitlin Smith who interprets the Robin Hyde poems. Two of the talented musicians I worked with on my 1997 album King of the Mercuries make a reappearance : Peter Scott on bass (Bluespeak) and Nigel Gavin on guitar and mandolin (Nairobi Trio, Jews Brothers). Completing the band are Vincent Pavitt (drums) and Tatiana Lanchtchikova (accordion). The album was produced at Link Audio, Ponsonby by Keith Ballantyne, the man responsible for the first Muttonbirds’ album and the latest release by the Topp Twins. Tidemarks has the honour of being the first release on my own label Red Shaver Records. Ross Mullins July 2001