The life of a D Generate
From CBGB's regular to jamming with the Boss, it has been a long three decades for Jesse Malin
By Steven Booth 02/07/2008
In the 1980s guerilla writer Camden Joy would write rants against the music establishment on posters he would place in random places around New York City. In between these rants, he would write great testimonials about ’80s era, pre-Nirvana indie rock bands like the Young Fresh Fellows and POPDEFECT. Somewhere along the line in his three-decade career, singer-songwriter Jesse Malin could have used a guy like Camden Joy.
It is not to say Malin has labored in obscurity like some modern-day Howard Roark. All the bands he has been in, from his teenage punk band Heart Attack to the more glam-infused D Generation received strong critical support, and his solo work has had help from fans such as Ryan Adams, Josh Homme and Bruce Springsteen. He has never had a problem getting his music out there, and he has a decent following.
You’d think, though, that somebody with his sizable body of work would be a little higher up on the food chain, commercially if not artistically. Listening to his 2007 release Glitter in the Gutter, you hear a guy firing on all cylinders artistically. He has melodies that Johnny Rzeznik couldn’t come up with in his wildest dreams, but enough crunch to keep his old D Generation fans happy. His voice has the perfect mix of Ryan Adams soul and Paul Westerberg nicotine. The record is all over the place stylistically, from the boozy rocker “In The Modern World” to the mournful “Broken Radio,” a duet with the Boss. In all the diversisity, he never loses focus of who he is.
Malin seems to be pretty happy with his lot in life. “I’m grateful,” he says as he drives through Manhattan. “I’m happy to be able to make music and records and not have to get a day job like pumping gas or selling shoes.”
For a guy in mid-career, he is also very busy, not content to lie around waiting for royalty checks. He is soon to tour with L.A.-based Irish punks Flogging Molly, setting out on his own tour in spring. He recently completed a live record and also a covers record that will be released in Europe. In the summer, he plans to go in and record the followup to Glitter. Playing acoustic shows like the one he has coming up at Zoey’s Café in Ventura give him a chance to work out the kinks in his new songs.
“These acoustic shows help me work out my new material and keep me honest,” he says. Most of his songs he writes by himself in his room. “I’ve always carried a pen, writing ideas on bar napkins and popcorn bags, whatever was around.” His writing centers on the world around him, including his native New York City. “You got to be like an antenna.”
Malin’s career started in the early 1980s with Heart Attack, an influential hardcore band that was a mainstay at the legendary CBGB’s. They broke up in 1983, and Malin played in small projects until showing back up on the radar in the early 1990s with the glam-punk D Generation. They went on to release three albums (plus a bunch of singles and appearances on compilations) between 1994 and 1999 with a revolving door lineup. After they broke up, Malin was briefly involved in some other bands, such as PCP Highway and Tsing Tsing/Bellvue, before settling into a solo career.
It was with the help of Ryan Adams that he put out his first full-length record The Art of Self-Destruction in 2003. Although he didn’t totally ditch the hard-edged sound he had with D Generation, his solo work incorporated country and folk influences, showing the influence of artists like Steve Earle and Neil Young. The critics liked it, too. The Web site Popmatters said: “Rich in heart-rending beauty, tough-but-lovable gutter poetry, and plenty of genuine emotion.” He made The Heat a year later and Glitter in the Gutter in 2007.
Even all the weirdness in the music industry, with its declining sales and dying record companies, doesn’t seem to faze him. “The record companies don’t support bands much anymore, but with the Internet it makes it much easier to get the word out,” Malin says.
When asked about his continued willingness to tour and promote records three decades into his career, Malin talks about the touring pratfalls of bad food, dirty hotels and crooked promoters; but then sums up what makes it all worth it: “When you get up onstage, it’s all about playing those 90 minutes.”
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