Interview: Jesse Malin

Jesse Malin has been a part of the New York alt-rock music scene for just about twenty years, beginning as a teenager with the hardcore band Heart Attack. In the 90’s, he gained widespread notoriety as front man for the glam-punk band D Generation. These days he has a fresh new sound and has just released his third solo album “Glitter in the Gutter” with contributions from Bruce Springsteen, Jakob Dylan, Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age), and of course his good friend Ryan Adams.

While supporting the new album, I had the pleasure of chatting with Jesse at Niagara, the East Village bar where he is a part owner. We sat in a cozy corner of the bar and spent an hour and a half discussing everything from the new album to New York City, including what his hopes are for the future and why he was wearing a back and neck brace.

The first question I’m going to ask, and I’m sure you’re sick of answering this question, relates to your collaboration with Bruce Springsteen on your new song “Broken Radio.” How did that come about, and what was it like to work with Bruce?

Well, when I made “The Fine Art of Self Destruction” I met Bruce at the Stone Pony, of all places, and he told me he really liked the cover that I had done of “Hungry Heart”. He hadn’t heard my solo record, but had read good things about it. Then I got a phone call from my manager saying “Bruce is gonna call you up at home, and he loves your record and he wants to talk to you about it”, and I was like “you’re joking!”

So he called, and we talked about the record for about an hour. He asked me to do some shows with him down in Asbury, which was holiday benefit shows for the local children’s community. I asked “what Christmas songs are we gonna play?” and he said “we’re gonna play your songs with my band, and I’m gonna play my songs”, and I was like “WHAT!?”

That went on for about three or four days, and it was just an amazing experience. The guy is so passionate; he learned all these songs of mine. It was pretty wild having him as my sideman…as my Keith Richards! So, we stayed in touch over the years as I made the second record…and I would see him if he played or had rehearsals, and he’d call once in a while or I’d bump into him at his gigs and he always asked “what are you listening to lately?”

Then I went to see him on the Pete Seeger Sessions tour in Massachusetts and he invited me to his rehearsals. I told him that the show was amazing, and that I was finally starting my next record, and he said “if something comes up, I would love to be part of it.” I went out to LA and did the record and I kept thinking about the right song…there was a song that I had written about my mom who had passed away when I was in my teens. She was one of those people who wanted to be a singer, but ended up becoming a waitress and a divorced parent. But if a song came on the radio, she was a hairbrush singer…singing in the house and in her car. I started to think about people, and about how music and radio could provide three or four minutes of liberation. And now it has changed and become this corporate-fucking-robot-jack-me-off kind of…un-radical thing.

I sent Bruce the lyrics in a letter and said “see what you think”…and then I’m in LA having a very LA moment, with the cell phone and the rental car, and he called and said he dug it. I went out to Jersey when I got my first chance to go back to the “right coast”, the east, and I went to the studio at his house. We had a great afternoon, and he’s just very giving and passionate. He’s a real team player and very humble. Suddenly, here is a song I wrote in my little crappy Lower East Side apartment, with the guy who sang “Thunder Road” that my dad used to listen to! Then we made a video…and it’s another song on the record but a very special moment.

You also collaborate with a lot of people on the album besides Bruce, Jakob Dylan being one and Ryan Adams being another. I know you and Ryan Adams are good friends — is this the first time you’ve ever collaborated with him on anything?

Ryan produced the first record, and he’s kinda done something on every record of mine since. You never know what he’s going to show up with. He always brings something different, and it’s always radically different…but it’s always super creative and wonderful. He’s a great guy. He’s a super force and I’m lucky to have that.

With Jakob, I was living in LA and was very lonely there, and I had just recently met him. I was living in a motel, and he invited me over to his house for a cookout on the fourth of July. I always liked his voice and it just kinda came naturally. That’s the freedom of being a solo artist, is that you can have different people show up and not offend the band.

You talk about being out in LA and getting back to the “right coast”. You’re so associated with the New York music scene, how does New York City inspire you?

I think you walk out your door and you get inspiration, because of one, walking places, and two, the mix of different cultures and the energy of all the different kinds of people. Now it has kind of become a city for the rich, and maybe there are less New Yorkers and less neighborhoods…but we’ve still got that thing.

There is an energy and a force of creativity. The sound, the light changing, the smell of the garbage, the look of the women, the people, the book stores, Central Park, Chinatown, the trains rattling along, the bike messengers… there is a pulse and a rhythm. To me, music in general is very cosmopolitan - and New York just has it. I like urban stuff. I’m going away and getting breaks from it more often, but it’s a great place to leave and come back to. I love people’s interpretations of New York on film, like the way Woody Allen does it in his films or in the way that people like the Rolling Stones and the Clash lamented it. Or the Pogues in “Fairy Tale of New York”, or Sinatra… there is so much of it in different time periods. You can watch channel thirteen (NY’s public television channel- ag) and see that, as it goes under the gentrification of it, it’s still New York!

What was your inspiration for this new album?

I had made a lot of records that were “break up” records. My first record was my first solo record, so I was my own shrink and exploring my demons and my childhood and this and that. The second record was written on the road, and it was made at the time when we were going to war with Iraq. I was learning more about being international and seeing how people viewed my country. Feeling like a New Yorker my whole life, I never fully thought I was an American. Then I realized how New York had become like the rest of America. But around the world, people really had this weird heavy attitude towards us because of the war and because of our imperialistic superpower piggish-ness.

I thought of a different look…also, being at an age where you’re away from home and living out of a suitcase and your friends your age are having kids and settling down…I was still feeling like a boy and a man.

I think rock and roll does that to you.

Yeah, well it keeps the youth in you in a lot of ways. So, by the third record I wanted to write something that wasn’t a “crying in your beer, heart on your sleeve” record, though that is always going to be an element of what I do. I wanted a record that was a record of hope and defiance and about surviving - a positive record. I started to think about a lot of the music I listened to growing up like Bob Marley. The Clash, The Ramones and even John Lennon were like “it’s gonna be alright”.

But also after five or six years of the orange alert and global warming, Katrina, gas prices, record stores closing, Iraq and Bush, and I felt that people shouldn’t have mindless disco fun and forget about the world, but try to be present and not fearing. To be able to go out in the present. To me, that is the good thing about rock and roll and going to shows. You can rent it, or you can watch it on YouTube, but to be in there…there is a ritual with strangers, to be in a pit with a lot of people sharing this. I’m not a religious person, but going to shows and sharing that feeling with people - that is my church. And I wanted to make a record that was representative of being in the moment and finding the things you need to get by, and enjoying life like it’s your last moment. Whatever you are, if you’re a carpenter, rock and roller, school teacher, or fucking drug dealer…whatever your passion is, to really be passionate about it and feel that.

I noticed you’re wearing a back and neck brace… please explain that!?

It’s my first interview with this question! (laughs) Ummm…you know, we toured a lot this year, we did…I don’t know, a bazillion gigs. We were just in the UK and Europe in May and when I got home I noticed that I had a little bite mark on the back of my neck. I didn’t know what it was when I scratched it. I take vitamins, I do pushups, I wasn’t worried about it. It wasn’t like I was in Africa, I was in Paris and Germany. I didn’t think much of it, and went out on the road about a week later and I started to have shoulder blade and neck pain. I thought I did something like talked on the cell phone the wrong way. Things went on, and before I knew it after doing TV appearances in California and in the South I started to get bad neck pains, bad shoulder pains, and I took some Advil thinking it was the tour bus. Then it got worse and I went to the emergency room and kept getting misdiagnosed. For about three or four weeks it got worse and worse and I wasn’t sleeping, and the pills they gave me weren’t working. I’ve never taken anything but vitamin C and suddenly I’m on vicodin and percocet and I’m not even sleeping. I had to cancel after Minneapolis. I was doing three weeks on fire because it was nerve endings, and it felt like someone was holding a big lighter to me.

I finally got back to New York and had an MRI and this doctor said “he’s got an abscess on the upper spine and shoulders, and an infection - get him to the emergency room!”

I think I’ve got a lot of malpractice suits to take care of (laughs). I ended up spending eight days in St. Vincent’s Hospital. They found out the name of the infection and I’m on antibiotics to kick it out. Because I was out there so long playing it kinda messed up my neck a bit and I have to lay off playing for a while. I had to cancel a slew of shows that I was excited about, but everything is going to be rescheduled and I’ll be back out in October. I miss it but I’m trying to make lemonade out of this time - I’m writing for another record. But we’re gonna work “Glitter in the Gutter” for a while. I feel like we’re just ramping up with it.

Last question! What is your hope for the future?

Ummm…that we can save the planet before it’s too late, so my grandkids and great grandkids and all of ours can get to enjoy Earth. Continue to make lots of records and be healthy and tour all over the world and make lots of money so I can have the freedom to buy good food and find alternative ways to do stuff. And to live outside of society and still be able to come in to try and subvert things when I can.

For more info such as tour dates and tv appearances and to hear some tracks off of “Glitter in the Gutter” check out:

www.jessemalin.com

And here is the official website of Niagara:

www.niagarabar.com

- Amy Grimm

Tags: Amy Grimm • Bruce Springsteen • D Generation • indie-rock • Interview • Jakob Dylan • Jesse Malin • Josh Homme • Music • NYC • Punk • Queens of the Stone Age