Making a name for themselves
For a long time, 25-year-old Jesse Blaze went without a last name. As the hard-rocking singer and guitarist for several New York bands, he used only his first and middle names. He avoided talking about his family during interviews. But his best efforts to remain an anonymous frontman were futile.
"No matter how hard I tried, everybody found out and gave me crap for riding my dad's coattails," he says. "So I might as well ride my dad's coattails."
Which is how Jesse Blaze Snider - the son of Twisted Sister singer Dee Snider - wound up reclaiming his identity and joining the cast of "Rock the Cradle," a new MTV series that pits the sons and daughters of music stars against one another in an "American Idol"-style competition. (See review on next page.)
Snider is part of a wave of second-generation musicians entering the family business, and their experiences dealing with the ups and downs of a rock 'n' roll birthright are as different as their sounds. Jordan Zevon (son of Warren), Salvador Santana (Carlos's kid), Liam Finn (Neil's eldest), Justin Townes Earle (Steve's boy), Crosby Loggins (Kenny's look-alike), and Adrian and Tony Perry (Joe's sons, who are in the Boston group TAB the Band) have recently released or will soon launch debut albums.
The one common thread is a fervent hope that the world will judge them on their own terms. "The only thing that offends me is hearing 'he's no Warren Zevon,' " says Jordan Zevon. "No [expletive]. I'm also not the Beatles or Bob Dylan."
For some, like Snider, carving your own musical niche means distancing yourself from your famous rocker parent. Salvador Santana has taken the opposite track - appearing with his father on talk shows and covering his dad's smash hit "Evil Ways" - much as Carlos Santana did when he started out.
"A lot of people think my dad is a self-made musician, but my pops got his start by playing guitar and violin in my grandfather's mariachi band," says Santana. "A lot of people in Mexico were saying, 'You'll never be as good as your father, Don Jose.' But it doesn't matter as long as you find truth and happiness in what you do. People say to me the son of the legendary guitar god must have so much pressure to fill his shoes. But I don't feel a sense of competition. There's just interaction."
And that has practical advantages, as well. When you're a budding musician whose father is the guitarist in Aerosmith and the band is recording in a state-of-the-art studio that happens to be located in your basement, it redefines home-schooling.
"I would go down after they finished, and I would ask the engineers questions," says Tony Perry, who engineered TAB the Band's debut album. "I would watch them edit things and play on Pro Tools and pick it up from that."
But for many children of music stars, domestic bliss is the first casualty of a rock lifestyle. Singer-songwriter Lucy Walsh, a contestant on "Rock the Cradle," embraces the perks of being Eagles lead guitarist Joe Walsh's daughter. Doors have opened for her that she knows would otherwise not have budged if she had a different last name.
"The downsides are personal," says Walsh, who has a deal with Island Records. "It's what being a rock 'n' roll star does to your family. My dad got sober when I was 13, and before that my mom kept me really far from him. My dad is a really interesting person with a lot of layers, and I'm incredibly proud to be his daughter. But I'm still getting to know him."
Being the female offspring of a male musician, Walsh has it easier than many of her peers, especially someone like Salvador Santana, whose Latin-rock sound has so much in common with his famous father's. Jordan Zevon is grateful that his influences - the Beatles, Elvis Costello, XTC - led him away from his father's classic-rock and blues-flavored music.
"He once asked me why I sing with an English accent," Zevon recalls. "I asked him why he sang with a Southern accent. It's who you love. We never sat down and played guitar together. We watched movies and ate lunch. Having the last name Zevon cuts both ways," but he'd feel stupid complaining about it. "Whether it's glass-blowing or contracting or music, people always look at the son to see if he's continuing the quality. That's what happens when you follow in the family business."
