Jahn Xavier

Jahn Xavier is a singer, songwriter, musician, poet, and author from a little island just off the east coast of the United States, raised and shaped on the streets of 1960s and 1970s New York City. After early exposure to the music world through close relatives and treasured mentors, he has played a variety of instruments since he was a child, and shows no sign of growing up anytime soon. Jahn (once known by the punk-rock nom de guerre X Sessive) has been a fixture on the NY music scene since he first made his way to CBGB and Max's Kansas City as a teenager in the summer of 1977, a time of musical change and explosive, unbridled creativity. He has been playing music professionally since September 23rd,1976, when he was 14 years old, and began playing in NYC clubs at 15. He was a founding member of teenage punk-rock band The Blessed, along with Nick Berlin (Nicholas Petti), Howie Pyro, and Billy Stark, but was justifiably sacked two weeks before their first performance at Max's in December 1977. One-time lead singer and guitarist for The Nitecaps (1980-1998, accompanied by the renowned Uptown Horns), NY deep-soul band Sugartime (2006-2010), songsmith and guitarist for The Ghosts (1978-1979), as well as bassist for Richard Hell & The Voidoids (1979-1980) and Sylvain Sylvain (of the legendary New York Dolls, 1984-1987),. Over his four-plus decades on stages and in studios, Jahn has been fortunate enough to work with a wide range of supremely talented musicians: some well-known, some unknown, some famous and some infamous. He has been lucky enough to invited onstage to sing with some of his favorite soul singers, most notably Solomon Burke and Rufus Thomas, and has recorded with John Sebastian of The Lovin' Spoonful. Jahn has recorded with several noted producers that include Clive Langer & Alan Winstanley, Richard Gottehrer, and JB Moore. He remains proud to be a part of his hometown's musical community, a city full of exceptional, mutually-supportive and supremely talented artists. Jahn performs regularly in and around NYC, both with his band The Bowerytones (featuring bassist Charles Roth and drummer Tom Curiano), and as a solo performer. His most recent album "Yes, You” (OJB Music) garnered substantial critical acclaim. He has also issued records on Sire/Warner Brothers and Woodstock Wax. He is currently working on a memoir entitled "Tales From A Rock And Roll Childhood (Or: Do You Want Fries With That?)" Jahn will be publishing a volume of poetry in late 2022, and is currently recording demos for his next album, to be released in Fall 2023. Jahn has always been first and foremost an expressive wordsmith, crafting turns of phrase that reveal the lessons of a lifetime, yet retaining a child’s sense of wonder. Noted music critic Jim Allen has said that Jahn’s writing features “a lyrical outlook that's equal parts street savvy and sagacious spirituality -- imagine vintage Elvis Costello after the kind of latter-day Zen study undertaken by Leonard Cohen and you're on the right track.” From iTunes: Jahn Xavier & The Bowerytones – “Yes, You” (OJB Records) "Jahn Xavier is a rock & roll lifer. Even a cursory listen to his belated solo debut album, Yes, You, makes that startlingly clear. While he made his bones in the punk era, his musical backstory starts with a childhood spent behind the scenes; with family working for the biggest rock booking agency of the era (the legendary Premier Talent), Jahn was tagging along to Fillmore East shows from the time he was six, an impressionable kid hobnobbing with world-shaping musicians -- his nine-year-old lungs once sang to The Who backstage on their Tommy tour. By the time he was in his teens he was a street kid who found a home at CBGG in that Bowery punk mecca's heyday, and at the tender age of 16 he became the boyish-looking bassist for punk-era icons Richard Hell & The Voidoids, playing under the punky alias of X-Sessive. Before he was out of his teens, Xavier was the frontman for another NYC band, The Nitecaps, who made an album for Sire Records in 1983 and trekked across Europe opening for U2 on the latter's War tour. A lifetime of left turns and life lessons later, Xavier, who spent some time refreshing his muse with local soul band Sugartime, has emerged as the leader of The Bowerytones (their name both a pun on the singer's preternaturally deep, soulful voice and the location of the club where he first found his feet). While their album includes echoes of Xavier's past, it mostly manifests the mature vision of a man who's been around the block enough to know what's worth singing about and how to make his message connect. The musical muscle that makes The Bowerytones move comes down to the vivid, visceral bass lines of C.P. Roth, who over the years has lent his talents to everyone from Suzanne Vega to Garland Jeffreys and Ozzy Osbourne, and drummer Denny McDermott, a veteran of sessions for David Johansen, Donald Fagen, Graham Parker, and countless others. Between the rhythm section's propulsive powers and producer J.B. Moore's artful-but-unobtrusive production, the scene is perfectly set for Xavier to unleash a talent at turns explosive and introspective on Yes, You. Sliding soulfully in on the slow-burning strength of "I Still Yearn," a song of struggle and survival that would have been right at home on, say, Solomon Burke's 2002 rock-star-penned comeback album Don't Give Up On Me, Xavier's album loses little time unveiling the man's gifts as a singer and songwriter. His low, throaty tones are laden with a lifetime's hard-earned gravitas, and his tunes mix rough-edged rock energy with the broad stylistic sensibilities of someone who's obviously spent his life as a true student of music. Steady-rolling rockers like "Walk the Other Way" and "Bad Behavior" blend biting riffs with a lyrical outlook that's equal parts street savvy and sagacious spirituality -- imagine vintage Elvis Costello after the kind of latter-day Zen study undertaken by Leonard Cohen and you're on the right track. On the rootsier side, the cowpunk stomp-and-slash of "Jesus De Milo" and the blistering blues-rocker "I'll Only Die If I'm Lucky" offer glimpses of the breadth of Xavier's abilities. On the quieter side, jazzy ballad "Under the Moon" paints the erstwhile punk as an inveterate urban romantic, and the slowly surging "Black Water Blues" suggest what might have happened if Otis Redding had a chance to sire a sequel to "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay." Ultimately, Yes, You is a powerfully personal statement fueled by honest intensity, a set of songs that look unflinchingly at life with arms outstretched to embrace whatever the world might have in store. - Jim Allen"