Michael Penn
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Michael Penn | |
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 Michael Penn in a promotional photo for the album Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947.
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| Born | August 1, 1958 Greenwich Village, New York City, US |
| Occupation | Singer, Composer |
| Spouse | Aimee Mann (December 29, 1997-present) |
| Parents | Leo Penn (film director) and Eileen Ryan (actress) |
| Children | Liam Penn (from previous marriage) |
Michael Penn (born August 1, 1958, in Greenwich Village, New York City) is an American singer and songwriter. He is the son of actor/director Leo Penn and actress Eileen Ryan, and the brother of actors Sean Penn and Chris Penn.
Prior to the release of his 1989 debut album March, Penn performed the song "This & That" with his band The Pull on a 1987 episode of Saturday Night Live. Before that, he was a member of the Los Angeles band Doll Congress and had appeared as an extra on a few television series, including St. Elsewhere.
March, particularly the first single, "No Myth," brought Penn attention, as well as the 1990 MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist. Penn's follow-up albums Free-for-All (1992), Resigned (1997) and MP4: Days Since a Lost Time Accident (2000) weren't able to match the success of March, although critics praised his songcraft.
Penn met fellow singer-songwriter Aimee Mann in the late 1980s, and during the recording of her album I'm With Stupid (to which Penn contributed vocals), the two struck up a friendship, which blossomed into romance and their 1997 marriage. Together with manager Michael Hausman they formed United Musicians, which is based on the idea of allowing artists to keep copyright ownership of their works and to assist with their promotion and distribution. Penn and Mann live in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles. They have no children, but Penn has a son, Liam Penn, from a previous marriage to Kate Dornan.
Penn moved into film scoring after repeated requests from director Paul Thomas Anderson, who had apparently listened to Free-for-All extensively while writing his first feature, Hard Eight, and wanted Penn to score the film. Penn also scored Anderson's follow-up Boogie Nights, in which he appears briefly as a recording engineer. During the editing process of the film, Anderson directed a music video with Penn for the song "Try" from Resigned (the music video can be found on the Boogie Nights DVD). Other films scored by Penn include Alan Cumming's first two directorial efforts, The Anniversary Party and Suffering Man's Charity [1]; Melvin Goes to Dinner; the documentary The Comedians of Comedy; and The Last Kiss.
Penn's fifth album, Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947, was released August 2, 2005, on Mimeograph Records (Penn's own label) and SpinART Records. Penn has said that the album, which may be the first of two parts, is set after World War II and involves "the trauma that a war brings to a person's psychology." [2]
A best-of compilation, Palms and Runes, Tarot and Tea: A Michael Penn Collection, is scheduled for release on April 17, 2007, as is a reissue of Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947 with bonus tracks.
[edit] Discography
- March (1989)
- Free-for-All (1992)
- Resigned (1997)
- MP4: Days Since a Lost Time Accident (2000)
- Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947 (2005)
- Cinemascope (2005)
- Palms and Runes, Tarot and Tea: A Michael Penn Collection (2007)
[edit] Singles
| Year | Title | Chart positions | Album | |||
| US Hot 100 | US Modern Rock | US Mainstream Rock | UK | |||
| 1989 | "No Myth" | #13 | #4 | - | - | March |
| 1990 | "This & That" | #53 | #10 | - | - | March |
| 1990 | "Brave New World" | - | #20 | - | - | March |
| 1992 | "Long Way Down (Look What the Cat Drug In)" | - | #14 | - | - | Free-For-All |
| 1992 | "Seen the Doctor" | - | #5 | - | - | Free-For-All |
[edit] External links
- Michael Penn (official site)
- Bunker Hill fan site
- United Musicians
- MySpace page
- Michael Penn at the Open Directory Project (suggest site)
- Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947 media kit
