Matthew Malley

Matthew Mark Malley was born on July 4th, 1963 in Oakland, California to Patrick Malley, a World War 2 Veteran and Berkeley fireman and Sara Malley, a stay at home mom. Matt has an older brother, James who is severely autistic. He also has 2 half-siblings, William and Laura Malley. A third half-sibling, Patrick, is deceased. His father was of Irish descent and his mother is of English and Scottish ancestry. Matt grew up in Oakland and lived there until his mid-30's when he moved to Southern California. Malley fell in love with the world of aviation at a young age and his father had him take flying lessons when he was 12 years old. On his 16th birthday in 1979, Matt soloed a Cessna 150 airplane in Concord, CA at Buchanan Field Airport. A couple of years after high school, Matt tried a year of college at Lambuth College in Jackson, Tennessee as a piano major. When he came back to California at the end of the school year, he joined a bluegrass band as their bass player and toured the U.S. and Canada for the next couple of years. Soon after leaving the band, Matt co-founded a popular Bay Area rock band called, "Mr. Dog." This band was managed by legendary concert promoter Bill Graham and played large local venues opening for bands like Crowded House and The Fixx. After Mr. Dogs' break up, Matt co-founded the multi-platinum selling 90's band Counting Crows. He co-wrote and played bass guitar on all of the band's early, biggest selling hit records and singles, ultimately selling 20 million records with the band in the 90's. Matt has appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone Magazine (issue 685 - June 30, 1994). Malley left the band in 2004 to get off the road and be with his family, helping raise his three sons. He has since operated his own recording studio and collaborated with artists such as Jon Anderson and Patrick Moraz of "Yes", Richard Thompson, Jerry Donahue and Judy Dyble of "Fairport Convention", Emitt Rhodes, Albert Lee, Rob Fetters and Beverly Martyn among others. These days Matt works part time in the transportation department for major motion pictures and TV shows and lives near Los Angeles with his wife, Sesh and their three sons, Tansen, Kabir and Kahlil.