Most will remember her as the broadcaster who fronted TV and radio shows for decades. But she’s changed her tune as Gina. Richard Betts on the reinvention of Leanne Malcolm.
Singer-songwriter Gina Malcolm has just released her second single, ‘Deep Dark Blue’. The words are raw and confessional and wreathed in echo. There are granite slabs of piano, spectral guitar and a ‘Ticket to Ride’-on-medication drum beat. It’s a bit Reb Fountain-ish or, for those of a certain vintage, a less blissed-out Mazzy Star, and it’s quite wonderful. Last December Malcolm released the similarly excellent ‘Don’t Expect the World’, which has an evocative, sepia-toned video, shot in the South Island’s wide-open spaces. Although Gina Malcolm has released just the two songs, there’s enough to suggest she’s one to watch.
You may have watched Malcolm before. Gina’s her middle name; she used to be and mostly still is Leanne.
“Gina’s a way more interesting name,” says Malcolm. “I never liked Leanne.”
We liked Leanne Malcolm, though. She was constantly in our homes throughout the 1990s and 2000s, and on and off thereafter, as a TV3 and RNZ National newsreader, presenter of shows including Nightline and the tradies’ nemesis, Target. Leanne was famous. No one knows Gina. If you want people to hear your music, why ditch the advantage of name recognition?
“I wanted to signal that I’m no longer the person I was,” says Malcolm, who recently turned 60 (“Hey, I’m going to own it”). “I’m not a newsreader any more, I’m not a celebrity. I wanted to signal a change, a new focus. I do want people to hear the music but because I’ve been so low-profile for so long, I’m perhaps nervous about the reception. But I’m in a great position in that I’m doing it for me; I have the means to make a video and record songs, and some talented people to work with.”
Chief among these is Arrowtown musician Tom Maxwell, of the band Killergrams. He and Malcolm have known each other since Malcolm moved to Central Otago in the early-2000s, when Maxwell was a youngster. He moved away, spent time in and around the fertile Lyttelton music scene, returned during Covid. The two re-entered each other’s orbit last year.
Malcolm, who’d had singing lessons and been performing in covers bands, was bursting with lyrics and ideas, and approached Maxwell about collaborating.
“I was terrified,” she says. “It took a lot of courage to show him [the songs]. They’re raw and from a deep place.”
If Malcolm brought poetry and a vision for the songs, Maxwell supplied the means to express them: the ability to put everything in its right place, the added touches that polish a rough demo into a finished song. Malcolm says that as a newcomer to the recording process, it made sense to follow Maxwell’s lead.
“I had to listen and take advice. It would have been dumb to go in there and say, right, I’m doing it this way.”
Maxwell’s way was quiet, restrained and, in the two songs so far released, unashamedly morose. It’s not entirely what Malcolm had in mind, but she found herself persuaded by what Maxwell imagined for her lyrics.
“For me,” says Maxwell, “the idea was to find something that felt authentically Leanne, true and honest. A lot of the poems she’d written were very exposing, very honest. Some were sorrowful. So the idea of fragility was a big part of the project, and we tried to lean into sparseness. That was probably one thing where there was a bit of… not disagreement. She maybe wanted it a certain way and we had to do a bit of convincing that this was the right sound and style to go for.”
Malcolm: “His advice all the way through was to pull back, let the microphone do the work. It was interesting because I’ve always thought the best thing was to belt it out. He kept saying, ‘No, your strength is the slow and meaningful and powerful song.’”
Malcolm initially wanted something rockier.
“I’ll happily admit I’m a bogan at heart and I love playing loud rock’n’roll. I’m a 60s kid, so for me the 70s is my go-to.” She likes a bit of Patti Smith, Jack White, music with a classic sound, and some of that could be on the cards in the future.For now, the rock racket is confined to Malcolm’s weekday show on Radio Central, which has beamed throughout Central Otago for four years.
“It’s great. I still enjoy being behind the microphone. I did TV but radio’s what I love. I don’t know how many listeners we have but it makes me happy.”
Radio Central owner Shane Norton isn’t sure how many listeners Malcolm gets either (“They don’t do surveys down here”) but he says the station receives plenty of positive responses. Sure, listeners recognise Malcolm from her TV days, but she’s one of them now, and the locals are as likely to know her from the school run. Norton met Malcolm because their kids played football together.
“People absolutely love [Malcolm’s show],” says Norton. “We speak to local people down here and the feedback is that people like hearing people on the radio that they know.”
The Leanne Malcolm people know last year turned up in an unlikely place, when she briefly joined The Platform, run by broadcaster Sean Plunket, which has a studio in Central Otago. That was… odd.
“When you’re down here there are no media opportunities,” reasons Malcolm. “Sean said I want you to do a show. I asked if I could make it an arts and music show and he said yes.”
She managed interviews with the likes of Exponents singer Jordan Luck and indie legend Shayne Carter, but the liberal Malcolm was a poor fit with The Platform’s usual diet of contrarian opinion.
“It was a total mismatch but Sean wanted a woman and I think I was meant to be the approachable person in the line-up, I hadn’t been cancelled.”
A disagreement over Plunket’s views on the Christchurch mosque attacks led to Malcolm’s resignation.
At least she had more time to work on her music, making room for the release of ‘Don’t Expect the World’. Coincidentally, Malcolm’s son, Joel, a drum’n’bass DJ who works under the name Altercation, had a new song out around the same time.
“It was the biggest thrill – mother and son on Spotify! He’s super-supportive and loves the fact there’s music all around us.”
The confessional nature of Malcolm’s lyrics must give him pause, though. Unlike singer-songwriters who use real life as a jumping-off point, Malcolm’s songs are deeply autobiographical.
“Sometimes I look at poor Joel and he listens to the songs and the words and he goes, ‘God, Mum, what do you mean by that? What does Don’t Expect the World even mean?’ I don’t want him to think I’m miserable or it was some pointed dig at his dad or anything like that.”
Joel’s dad – Malcolm’s husband – is Philip Smith, head of film and TV production company Great Southern.
“Phil was intrigued and surprised [about the music],” Malcolm says. “I don’t think he knew what to expect but he thinks it’s great. He also thinks it’s quite an expensive hobby. I had to tell him it’s not actually a hobby.”
The family support has been welcome. Malcolm’s had a tough time in the last decade. When we speak, Malcolm’s mother is in the final stages of a terminal illness, and many of Malcolm’s unrecorded songs are a way of processing that. (Sadly, Malcolm’s mother died days before the publication of this story.) Malcolm herself experienced what she calls “a scrape” with breast cancer in 2014. And she lost her father to cancer eight years ago. ‘Deep Dark Blue’ is about him.
“The words describe scattering my father’s ashes in Pauanui. I was very close to him and it was something I’d been putting off. I remember that day; we went out on the boat, it was pretty rough. The ocean was particularly blue, it just looked so deep. There was a feeling of peace, like a lot of people have when saying farewell.”
Malcolm uses universal phrases a lot: like a lot of people; everyone goes through that.
“I’ve had many great experiences and a fair bit of fortune in my life, so to moan about the bad times sounds a bit entitled,” she explains, though it feels like she’s pre-empting any Kiwi tall poppy nonsense too. “I’m not the only human who feels loss and despair; life is a series of obstacles amid the happy, carefree times.”
And although her songs reflect personal experiences, Malcolm says several times that she wants listeners to connect with them.
“I want to release music that people relate to and that gives people pleasure,” she says. “I want to keep producing music and I’d love to play these songs live. David Bowie said something like, the great thing about getting older is you finally become who you were meant to be. I totally relate to that. This isn’t me trying to be famous, I’m just doing something I need to do.”
First published in The New Zealand Herald, Canvas magazine, 7 May, 2023.
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