Jim Malone Music

BIO

Jim Malone began his obsession with songwriting at age 5 with a reworking of the melodramatic 60’s pop song, Leader of the Pack. He called it Bourbon on the Rocks. It's unclear where the inspiration came from, but the songwriting seed was planted and would rear its head throughout Malone's varied projects: as the leader of the early 90’s, Richmond, VA-based, jam band Left Exit; in the late 90’s, NYC-based, alt-country band Standpipe; and on several solo releases.

Despite successful forays into animation (He was the voice director for the original Pokemon series and produced four popular Saturday morning cartoons.) and woodworking/furniture design (He is the founder of the sustainable furniture brand, CounterEv HOME.), Malone has also been a lifelong singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer, and audio engineer.

His prolific career started at age 8, studying piano under Felix Molzer, a former director of the Vienna Boys Choir, whose austerity might have turned Jim away from music had he not discovered The Beatles and taught himself guitar. By age 14, he had formed his first band, HOT ICE, which rocked the 8th grade dance at Holy Cross Elementary School on the Jersey Shore, where he grew up.

After college at the University of Richmond in Virginia, Malone spent another 4 years touring the South with Left Exit, sharing the stage with Little Feat, Edie Brickell and New Bohemians, and Widespread Panic, among others.

After Left Exit, Malone returned to the Jersey Shore and released a solo CD, Stronger Than Silence, on Safety Net Records, before making his way to New York’s Lower East Side where he built a recording studio and formed the alt-country band, Standpipe.

In the late 90’s, Malone turned his attention to animation—specifically, anime, first as a voice director, then as a producer. But, songwriting still managed to play a role in Jim’s creative output as he wrote over 20 theme and featured songs for several Saturday morning cartoons.

In 2006, Jim left the cartoon world for woodworking, which started with the building of a log cabin in Catskill, NY, and grew into CounterEvolution, Jim’s sustainable furniture company, which made tables for over 200 Shake Shacks worldwide, all out of reclaimed bowling lanes. But music making remained a constant despite all his other pursuits.

In 2007, Malone began releasing the Malone Alone albums, followed by the colors of the spectrum, starting with Red, which was followed by Orange in 2009. But, the series stalled as the demands of running CounterEv increased. Then, as a result of the pandemic, in 2023 Malone closed CounterEv and opened a new recording studio retreat in Upstate New York called Little Big North. His return to music production means the Malone Alone series will pick up where it left off, and indeed, MA-Yellow and Green are both due for release in 2024.

Producing Left Exit's "Do It Anyway" at Shorefire Recording studio with engineer, Michael Hammel (SF)

Malone Alone Orange album release party at Under Acme w/Rebecca Weiner, Mat DeVeau and Mike Davis. (SF)

With Danny Lentz at the CounterEv showroom (DF)

At the CounterEv showroom with Mary Connolly, Rebecca Weiner and Paul McKenzie (DF)