What do Edgar Allen Poe, Prince, Tom Waits, Kate Bush, Carl Jung, Bjork, David Bowie, Beowulf and Anne Rice have in common?

Reanimation.

That's the title of a new album by this singer, songwriter and drummer from Ontario, NY, whose musical career began Christmas Day, 1976.

Malcolm, as captured by Bill Zules.“I got a Mickey Mouse drum kit,” Malcolm says. “I subsequently took drum lessons and played along to records.”

But rest assured Reanimation is no Disney affair.

“It's a supernatural story of someone trapped in a nightmare, unable to wake up,” Malcolm says. The album's eight original compositions ultimately portray renewal, he adds.

One of his strongest sources of inspiration? The aforementioned Rice. Her creative style. Her fearlessness.

“I think that she has always had a heart for the underdog,” he says.

“Anne Rice inspires me artistically, spiritually, and emotionally. Reanimation is most definitely a spiritual journey, and I can't help but think of her, especially on a song like Why Are You Afraid Of Love?”

Last year was a tumultuous one for the musician. In the face of personal loss, he poured himself into the album and set about learning how to live in the present.

“What started out as a sabbatical turned into a whole other journey with my own faith in the face of death,” he says.

This collaborative album, produced by Roman Klun on Innsbruck Records, features a mix of haunting harmonies, driving percussion, penetrating lyrics, and Malcolm's lead vocal, reminiscent of Jim Kerr in its warmth and depth.“It forced me to start living my life by recognizing that the length of our time on earth is unpredictable.”

Still, for all the analysis and clarity that informs his art, Malcolm says he won't entirely understand Reanimation until he has the benefit of some distance from it.

Perhaps because it takes time to ponder his own work. Or because it's just as important to him for his audience to find meaning in it, he says.

Whether for self reflection or feedback or both, he's left the door open to interpret his own work further.

“There's that whole school of cut-up technique,” he says. “From Burroughs' Naked Lunch to Bowie's Outside, Earthling to Beck, where words aren't comprehensible in the traditional sense, but somehow they speak to us.”

“I can tell you what these songs mean to me right now, but I've learned from experience that, over time, they'll eventually reveal much, much more,” Malcolm says. “As my life unfolds, new truths will be uncovered.”

Listen to him.

* * *

Reanimation is coming soon to Amazon.com, CD Baby, and iTunes. Malcolm is planning a few shows and a record release party for later in 2011. And he's already working on a sequel to Reanimation, titled Wraith, which he hopes to release in 2012.“Wraith will be a much darker album,” he says.

 

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