Money Mark - Push the Button [2CD Japanese Limited Edition] (1998)

Money Mark, a.k.a. Mark Ramos-Nishita, made his name playing keyboards with the Beastie Boys, and he's an expert at pulling funk out of anything with buttons on it--the more obsolete, the better. Push the Button, his second album, finds him moving away from the instrumental soul-groove quickies of his previous LP, Mark's Keyboard Repair, and toward, well, new wave songs--with singing. Ramos-Nishita's songs are unexceptional but pleasant; his arrangements are what make them work, especially the delicious keyboard parts. About half of Push the Button is still throwaway instrumentals--75 seconds of bossa nova, two minutes of organ-and-melodica doodling. They're Money Mark's real forte and have a genuine soulfulness that comes more easily to his hands than to his voice. --Douglas Wolk