After teaching himself to play guitar, Ritsema started writing songs in the late seventies, inspired by the punk and new wave movements.

Around 1979 the pair (with Ritsema now on bass) joined singer/guitarist Arjo Hijmans, and guitarist Ed Versloot, to form their first serious, but short lived, band Torpedos.

In this (classic) line-up Spasmodique remained active until 1990, gaining a solid live-reputation in the Netherlands and releasing a few cassettes during the first half of the decade.

After Hijmans left in 1990, they worked with guitar players Niek den Brave, Hans Brussee and Raymond Gerrits, and finally broke up in 1992.

They recorded the soundtrack for the short movie In Forced Perspective by Favola Film (Rino Gouw and Hugo Goudswaard) and performed live in the Rotterdam club Rotown under the name Villa Delirium.

The album Villa Delirium was finally released in 2002 and the book Cellar of Roses, about Spasmodique, edited by Jean-Paul van Mierlo, was launched at the same time.

Most of the band members left after the tour, so Ritsema and Cramer were joined by percussionists Joke Hamminga (East Meets West) and Coen Aalberts (Willy Nilly), and drummer Ron de Bruijn.

In 1997 Ritsema formed Last Side Show with Jean-Marie Aerts, Chris Grem and Coen Aalberts (replaced by Ron de Bruijnduring the first Dutch tour ) but the band broke up before the end of the year due to logistic problems.

After a few radio shows, double bassplayer Peter Jessen was recruited and the band name was changed to Mark Ritsema & Trio Raskolnikov.

Combining Ritsema's new songs, written each week, with jazzy improvisations, they rapidly became an established band that began playing throughout the Netherlands.

In 2003 UNSOUND released new albums by both Q-Club and Raskolnikov (with Aalberts again replaced by De Bruijn), and the two bands also shared the stage during the theatrical music show UNSOUND0007, with visuals and video footage by Favola Film.

During 2007/2008 Raskolnikov was fairly inactive, due to Ritsema's solo-activities, Grem's work for Charlie Dée and Jessens's growing activities in the classical/avant-garde music world.

In 2005 Ritsema produced the first demo of the young singer/songwriter Vera Juhrend and continues to play guitar in her band (with Peter Jessen and Ron de Bruijn).

Ritsema is also a journalist who regularly contributes to the cultural monthly magazine Uit Agenda Rotterdam, and the Lowlands Festival newspaper Daily Paradise.

With visual-artist Arno van de Pol he created the graphic novel In A Valley of Wolves which accompanies the deluxe edition of the Nightporter album of the same name.

Mark Ritsema: ‘De woede uit mijn eerste songteksten is er nog, maar het is breder.’ at Passionate (in Dutch) 3.