Jesse Malin shares video for “State of the Art”. The new album Sad and Beautiful World will be out September 24 on Wicked Cool Records.

Jesse Malin is sharing a new video for “State of the Art,” a nod to Kubrick, Barry Lyndon and Wes Anderson, filmed in an old mansion in Staten Island. Directed by Xander Strohm and Dave Stekert--the team behind Malin’s 2020 livestream series, the Fine Art of Self Distancing—the video stars Malin’s longtime band, Cat Popper, Derek Cruz, Rob Klores and drummer Randy Schrager, as a chef who serves up “the beets.”

“It was fun to go somewhere I didn’t even think existed,” says Malin. “It’s the first time we all reunited outside of downtown New York. This is a statement about how isolated we’ve been and getting lost in all the distractions that can be filtered into our homes while we’re overselling ourselves,” he laughs.

Watch the video for “State of the Art” and the previously released “Tall Black Horses.”

“My music has always been about rebirth and redemption,” says Malin, who wrote and recorded the upcoming double album Sad and Beautiful World to help get him through the chaos outside his apartment in New York City. “This album is for those who pick up the pieces and find beauty in the madness.”

Watch the previously released video for “Tall Black Horses.” Sad and Beautiful Worldwill be out September 24 on Wicked Cool Records, and available for preorder here. The expanded vinyl edition of the album includes three bonus songs. Jesse and his band will be touring throughout 2021, including a hometown show October 23 at Brooklyn Made in NYC with special guests H.R. (Bad Brains), Tommy Stinson, Cat Popper and opener Hollis Brown. Tickets are on sale now.

The follow up to 2019’s Sunset Kids, Malin’s acclaimed album produced by Lucinda Williams and Tom Overby, Sad and Beautiful World  takes its title from a line of dialogue in Jim Jarmusch's 1986 cult-classic film Down By Law. A lyric in the song “Almost Criminal” gives the double record its theme: Roots Rock Radicals, Malin’s take on a phrase from the intersection of punk and reggae back in the day.

The "Roots Rock” side leans to the sad-eyed ballads, while its companion, the "Radicals" side, roughs things up a bit. But not everything is as black and white as the movies. All of Sad and Beautiful Worldis both tough and tender, laced through with vividly drawn characters striving against circumstance and a raw emotional tenor. The songs served up here will break your heart, move your hips, and keep the lights shining.

Throughout 2020, Malin created and produced the celebrated weekly livestream series The Fine Art of Self Distancing to keep people connected worldwide and dancing on their couches. The show raised money for independent national venues, his band, crew and the Joe Strummer Foundation, and was named one of the best of the year by Entertainment Weekly and Rolling Stone.

“When I was a kid in Queens, my mother had a sign over the kitchen sink with a flower or something, that said ‘today is the first day of the rest of your life.’ I still feel that way. Growing up here, you find a way to carry your dreams up from the street and out to the stars. I try hard to keep my sense of humor, community and always find a way to dance through the flames.” 

Sad and Beautiful World

LP1: Roots Rock

Greener Pastures

Before You Go

State of the Art

Crawling Back to You

Tall Black Horses

Lost Forever

Dance on My Grave

Sinner

LP2: Radicals

Backstabbers

The Way We Used to Roll

Todd Youth (featuring H.R.)

Almost Criminal

A Little Death

Dance with the System

Saint Christopher

Tour Dates

Sept 17 Asbury Park, NJ The Stone Pony (See Hear Now Festival)

Sept 25 London, UK Rough Trade East @ 6pm

Sept 27 Glasgow, Scotland King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut

Sept 28 Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK Cluny

Sept 29 Manchester, UK Night & Day Café

Sept 30 Leeds, UK Belgrave Music Hall

Oct 2 Leek, UK The Maude

Oct 3 Sheffield, UK The Greystones

Oct 5 Bristol, UK The Fleece

Oct 6 Leicester, UK The Musician

Oct 7 Nottingham, UK Metronome

Oct 8 London, UK The Garage

Oct 9 Brighton, UK Mid Sussex Music Hall

Oct 22 Hamden, CT Space Ballroom

Oct 23 Brooklyn, NY Brooklyn Made

Oct 26 Göteborg, Sweden Pustervik

Oct 27 Stockholm Obaren

Oct 28 Malmö, Sweden Folk å Rock

Oct 30 Amsterdam, NL Rootzz Festival

Nov 1 Bruxelles, Belgium AB Club

Nov 2 Paris, FR La Boule Noire

Nov 3 Oberhausen, Germany Nochtwache

Nov 4 Hamburg, GER Nochtwache

Nov 6 Groningen, NL TakeRoot Fesival

Nov 7 Deg Haag, NL Paard