Overview: As the owner of Celebrity Talent Agency, a venture 25 years in the making, Mark Green’s story is one of perseverance and innovation.

Hailing from Hackensack, NJ, Mark Green embarked on his career in 1977 as a DJ, performing at high school events and local parties around Bergen County. His early exposure to rapping came from a competition in the Bronx, which he brought back to New Jersey, becoming a mentor to future Hip-Hop legends like Guy O’Brien, aka Master Gee of the Sugarhill Gang. Green’s influence on O’Brien helped shape the early Hip-Hop scene.

Telling his stories galore here within The Show Must Go On: Backstage Stories of a Hip-Hop Agent (out now via Mynd Matters), New York Times bestselling author Mark Green recants the paths taken, the forks in the road both taken and untaken, and the choices made throughout his career that have led him to where he is today.

Verdict: Before I delve into the prose of the book before me, allow me to fill you in a bit more on the man himself. Mark Green’s professional career began with an internship at Sugar Hill Records, the label behind the first major Hip-Hop single, Rapper’s Delight. He went on to work full-time at Hush Productions, where he handled various roles, including project management, artist development, and road management.

His work with notable artists such as Melba Moore, Freddie Jackson, Dru Hill, Prince, Al B Sure, Grandmaster Flash, and Usher solidified his reputation in the industry. This experience paved the way for his next role at Associated Booking Corp, where his talent for spotting rising stars led to the signing of chart-topping acts like Salt-N-Pepa, Roxanne Shante, Kid & Play, and DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince.

Green moved on to EMI/Capitol Records, where he was the Director of Marketing and held roles in Radio Promotions, Jazz, and Rap, earning accolades such as the Promotions Person of the Year in 1992. His work at EMI included producing, writing, and publishing successful tracks like Remember the First Time for Eric Gable and Midnight Hour for Spice MC.

In 1997, Green ventured into independent marketing and promotions consulting and secured a record deal with Light Year/Warner Brothers for his independent label, with Teena Marie as his first artist.

One year later, as a consultant at Northstar Distribution, Green became General Manager, distributing music for Prince’s independent label, which included Chaka Khan and Larry Graham on NPG Records. This role laid the groundwork for launching Celebrity Talent Agency, which represents a wide array of stars, and secures talent for tours, festivals, and commercials globally.

As for the book itself, well, I have to say that I have been a journalist within the entertainment industry for over 40 years now and yet love the fact that even I can still be astounded by the recalling of behind-the-scenes mechanics that led to who we adored back then and, in a lot of cases, still do today.

As we all know by now, every successful person began somewhere, was moved and motivated by people, things, and events, and some of the greatest lessons exist not only in why it happened, but how it occurred.

For Mark, it actually took ahold of him before he toured with, managed, distributed work by, and represented such names as Melba Moore, Lillo Thomas, the Force M.D.s, the Boogie Boys, Al B. Sure!, Missy Elliott, Timbaland, Roxanne Shanté, Salt-N-Pepa and Spinderella, Sparky Dee, DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, Les Nubians, Phyllis Hyman, Tom Browne, MC Shan, Biz Markie, Teena Marie, James “J.T.” Taylor (The O’Jays and Kool and the Gang), Chaka Khan, Prince, Roy Ayers, Lil Jon, Cissy Houston, Dennis Edwards, and Grandmaster Flash.

We first get to know more about this acorn of awareness within him, which seems to have been culled whilst Mark was in high school back in 1975. His band Black Pearl (co-created with his friend Freddie Williams) had broken up and as a result, Mark had a lot of equipment and so had to start afresh.

Black Pearl had made a name for itself in and around Bergen County, New Jersey, covering ’70s R&B hits at weddings and other get togethers, but now Mark wanted more and so (quite literally) amplified his equipment together with his mother’s records. After connecting the equipment to the band’s cabinet speakers, and borrowing a turntable from a friend, all that was then needed to get heard were venues.

Of course, those would soon follow, and DJ L.C. (a moniker born of his football name LC Greenwood) would be playing funk, soul, R&B, pop, and disco artists’ best songs at private parties, rec centers, and sporting events all around town.

Assisted by his partner David Heard (aka Rock Bottom), the native of Hackensack, New Jersey made a name for himself on the decks. He was so successful, a promoter invited him to compete in the Battle of the DJs in the Bronx.

So that was where the acorn of awareness was most definitely born for the industry and his own talents, but it was most definitely as a record executive, where Mark redefined the role as the industry knew it.

Thus here within these 318 or so pages, and complete with some era defining color photographs (including one that shows Mark as an extra on the film Malcolm X alongside Denzel Washington), we first get a professional, albeit lovingly imbibed foreword from Guy O’Brian aka Master Gee, which is backed by an incredible 61 chapters of truly inspirational, educational, and highly impassioned prose that once you start to read is very hard to put down.

Currently, Green serves as Associate Director/General Manager of Lehman Performing Arts Center, Chairman of Artist Relations for The Hip-Hop Museum (THHM), and maintains ownership of Celebrity Talent Agency. He continues to influence the entertainment industry profoundly because, The Show Must Go On.

About the Author - Mark Green, New York Times bestselling author of Who Runs Congress?, worked with Ralph Nader for ten years in Washington, D.C., before serving for twelve years as New York City’s Consumer Affairs Commissioner and Public Advocate.

A television commentator, public interest lawyer, and the former Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City, Green is also the founder and president of the New Democracy Project, a national and urban affairs institute. He has been a lecturer at the New York University School of Law since 2002, and lives with his family in New York City.

Mark Green @ Facebook