Pelt, Keenan Lawler & Eric Clark - Keyhole II (Eclipse Records, 2003)

A1 Untitled
B1 Untitled
C1 Untitled
D1 Untitled

On May 13, 2001, at the Louisville (KY) Visual Arts Associationís gallery at the Water Tower was host to the Keyhole ensemble. Ensemble members include Eric Clark, a metal worker who made some of the singing bowls and the bronze didgeridus played here, Patrick Best, Mike Gangloff, and Jack Rose, who also play as the trio Pelt, and Keenan Lawler, who is known for electronically modifying the sounds of a cello and National steel guitar. This performance was completely acoustic, however, with the only sonic treatment being the reverb lent by the galleryís high ceiling.
"My memories of this show are of the incredible resonance of the Water Tower gallery, just an amazing alive quality to the air that let each note linger on and on and that filled the quieter moments with breath and inevitability. At one point I remember being lifted, compelled to climb to a balcony over the room and lean out to play a singing bowl. If this drops, I recall thinking as I stirred the heavy brass, we may lose an audience member...but this sound is necessary. Awhile later, a man fell out of his seat and a woman who had been lying on the floor sat up suddenly and cracked her head on a glass table." Mike Gangloff.
Eclipse Records

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Pelt, Keenan Lawler & Eric Clark - Keyhole (Eclipse Records, 2000)

A1 Untitled
B1 Untitled

This album is drawn from a pre-dawn session in a stone silo at Mount Saint Francis, a Franciscan friary just north of the Kentucky-Indiana state line. Four of the musicians, Keenan Lawler and Pelt members Patrick Best, Mike Gangloff, and Jack Rose, had played earlier that night at Rudyard Kipling's Café in Louisville. They were joined by Eric Clark, a multi-instrumentalist and metal worker who makes musical instruments, such as singing bowls and bronze didgeridus. Mikal Dimmick used a stereo microphone to capture events as they unfolded in the early morning hours of 12 July 2000. Only acoustic instruments were played and no electronic effects or processing were used.
Eclipse Records

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Pelt - Snake To Snake (Klang Industries, 1996)

A Sun Is Apart No. 2
B1 Gavanji I
B2 Gavanji II

Good God, where did this record come from? I've listened to the thing about ten times now and I'm still beside myself. I guess I should've paid a whole lot more attention to Brown Cyclopaedia so I would've had some inkling of the shape of things to come. Max Meadows finds Pelt exploring the inner- and outermost reaches of avant-flipped psych-noise like an evangelical preacher studies the four gospels. The band hops on somebody's magic carpet and takes the rug for a very heady ride across no fewer than three continents and at least a dozen time zones. I hear bits of Ash Ra Tempel, Charalambides, Agitation Free, Ya Ho Wha 13, and Skullflower, along with a heaping dose of cracked invention straight from the digits and crania of Pelt. Max Meadows features a wonderful blend of high-octane drones, quixotic eastern boodle, and freedom-grasp histrionics that combines to form one of the better listens I've had during the past six months. It's quite heartening to know this Virginia troupe is tending shop in the here and now (as opposed to across the drink and/or 25 years ago in time) and I might even have a chance to see 'em live if I play my cards right. And speaking of their "live" performance, Snake to Snake captures Pelt on two separate occasions during the '95-'96 basketball season that display the band in exceptional form. I'm thinking the resplendent stigmas of the desert Crocus must have been carried across land and sea on these particular nights because the music sounds as if it was bathed in a warm orange dye and hung out to dry beneath the starlight. Of note is side two's "Gavanji II," a Fricke-meets-Radeulescu eastern-fuelled power summit that'll have you floating above the shifting sands before you can exchange your nickels for rupees. Max Meadows and Snake to Snake make for perfect sonic companions while enjoying a casual read through the Koran -- and hey, even if you can't read Arabic, the music will make all that crazy writing look just that much cooler. I believe it's time to turn my answering machine back on and re-establish contact with the disjected minions of the drug-plugged hinterland -- cuz if I don't, Pelt are liable to release another three albums of prime cosmic huff right under my nose and I'll no doubt be the last poor bastard to smell 'em.
Opprobrium

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Pelt - Skullfuck / Bestio Tergum Degero (VHF Records, 2006)

1 Calais To Dover 20:34
2 Bestium Tergum Degero pt. 1 17:26
3 Bestium Tergum Degero pt. 2 5:10
4 Bestium Tergum Degero pt. 3 1:56

Limited edition live CD released for the band to sell on their 2006 European tour. Contrary to the Grateful Dead reference in the title, “Skullfuck” is a tight recording of a single, intense November 2005 performance from NYC’s Knitting Factory. The set begins with an epic group arrangement of Jack Rose’s “Calais To Dover,” (from his Kensington Blues LP) with Jack’s 12 string shadowed by Mike Gangloff’s fiddle, and the thick drone of Mikel Dimmick and Pat Best’s Harmonium and Sruti’s. The three part “Bestio” suite follows, with the group moving to Tibetan bowls and gongs, building up a huge sheet of sound which peaks in a brief “encore” of wild gong smashing.
VHF Records

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Sad New: Jack Rose RIP

Jack Rose s'en est allé, hier, à l'âge de 38 ans / Jack Rose passed away, yesterday, at the age of 38, he will be missed...

Jack Rose - Red Horse, White Mule (Eclipse Records, 2002)

A Red Horse
B1 Dark Was The Night, Cold Was The Ground
B2 White Mule Part 1
B3 White Mule Part 2
B4 Hide The Whiskey (Blues For The Colonel)

Dès l’ouverture, son toucher pur et harmonieux ne tarde pas à se révéler, il est à associer à une force charismatique grâce à laquelle il développe des compositions nuancées dans les émotions qu’elles transmettent, de la mélancolie à la contemplation, suivant en permanence le fil d’une intensité extrême. De Red horse à White mule, Jack Rose mène sa monture habilement, jouant sur la cadence, il la porte du trot au galop pour atteindre des dénouements poignants. Il surprend par ailleurs dans son aptitude à se forger un jeu très personnel, parvenant à insuffler une grande modernité aux morceaux tout en conservant les bases d’un style musical décidément éternel. Dark was the night, cold was the ground de Blind Willie Johnson semble ainsi traverser les ages: repris l’an dernier par Marc Ribot pour The soul of a man, par Ry Cooder il y a quinze ans pour Paris, Texas, ce standard se voit ici interprété par Rose.
Webzine Mille-Feuilles

Jack Rose has been in Pelt for a while now and has been an integral force in their stunning output over the past five-ish years. While the band is best known for sprawling tones, spontaneity and occasional dissonance, Rose has found the time to extract himself from this formula for two releases that demonstrate his remarkable skill as a blues guitarist. In a little more than a year, Rose's acoustic side has issued a CDR and an LP (both in limited quantities) that have been uniformly praised by all those fortunate enough heard them. The CDR, Hung Far Low, Portland, Oregon, first saw the light of day as a largely tour-only release in 2001. It was far too brief, but inspired covers, such as Mississippi John Hurt's "Nobody's Business," demonstrated that Rose possessed a definite talent that had never been expressed in this way with Pelt. Red Horse, White Mule (Eclipse Records, from an edition of 318 copies) plays for thirty-five minutes and is short, like it's predecessor. That said, those minutes have the ability to completely transport the listener, and are destined to be played over and over again.
The material is very emotional and intense. Over every bit of new music I've heard this year, regardless of the source, not one other album contains as much of the performer's soul as this LP. Rose has undeniably poured himself into his writing, as well as this particular performance. No matter what I do to try to explain this record, I know that I'll fall short of Kisan Nagai's massive essay from the back of the LP cover. To quote him, "it can truly be said that Jack Rose has the Blues." While that line reeks of hyperbole and cliché, one listen to the LP will reveal that the statement is completely accurate and wholly appropriate.
"Red Horse" is the album's side-long first track. It is a sixteen-minute epic that is full of quiet authority. It starts off with a few attention-grabbing strums intermixed with a little bit of picking that reveals the song's overall melody. This sort of structure moves along for a minute or so until the tune's drive really begins to take shape. Rose is content to kick the pace into overdrive from time to time within the number, generating an incredibly fast picking pace at several points along the track's duration. From start to finish, the track remains captivating.
The LP's second side starts with "Dark was the Night, Cold was the Ground." The track's sound, from the playing style to the material, completely resembles a modern-day impression of all the great delta blues masters. Rose has to be making them all smile. "White Mule part 1" is powered by a distinctly circular rhythm. It rolls and churns for a brief three minutes before segueing into "White Mule part 2". The second portion slows down while retaining a bit of the first's lyrical drive. This trend continues throughout the rest of the track, along with the occasional ebb and flow in guitar speed. The end product is fully mesmerizing. The album closes out with "Hide the Whiskey (Blues for the Colonel)." Nearly dissonant hard picking takes shape and forms a unified and expressive blues riff before falling apart again right as the needle lifts off the vinyl.
Red Horse, White Mule is one of those moments where substance and style meet and harmoniously become one. The acoustic is an uncomplicated instrument that can produce so many different types of sounds. While it is debatable whether or not traditional blues represents a type of music that is more "pure" or "true" than other forms, I think there can be no debate as to the emotional impact that can come from the blues when they are properly played. Jack Rose is a new and important voice within the genre and this LP is simply fantastic.
While on the topic of Jack and other things Pelt, Klang's latest offering in the Klang Archives series is an ultra limited (40 copies) CDR of a Pelt show from Houston in 2001. Jump on over to klang.org or Eclipse Records and try to find a copy if they're still available. As phenomenal as Pelt's double disc Ayahuasca was, this is one of the best Pelt releases in the last few years. Recorded on May 16, 2001, Houston 2001 is thirty-one minutes of Pelt hitting all of the proper notes in stride. The disc consists of three untitled tracks, but each one definitely hits a chord and works. The first two tracks are shorter, each utilizing a different part of Pelt's drone armada. The centerpiece is the discs final track - twenty minutes of layered goodness. Brevity is of no concern when it comes to this disc. Pick it up now while you still have a chance.
Cory Rayburn, Fakejazz

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Jack Rose - Two Originals Of... (VHF Records, 2004)

1 Red Horse (14:45)
2 Dark Was The Night, Cold Was The Ground (2:39)
3 White Mule (3:01)
4 White Mule II (9:36)
5 Hide The Whiskey (Blues For The Colonel) (3:31)
6 Yaman Blues (10:04)
7 Linden Ave Stomp (3:49)
8 Mountaintop Lamento (11:24)
9 Black Pearls (9:16)

Compilation de deux albums pour son premier Cd, Red Horse, White Mule et Opium Musick... Fingerpicking et Ragas à la Jack Rose.

Debut solo CD from Jack Rose, combining his much-lauded Eclipse LP's Red Horse, White Mule and Opium Musick. While Red Horse, White Mule is generally recognized as in the Takoma-inspired tradition, Jack adds his own exotic influences and recognizable touch - whether abstracting on the modal epic "Red Horse" or the rough slide stylings of "The Colonel's Blues." Opium Musick is an eclectic collection with pieces for 12 string (the percussive and dark "Black Pearls), 6 string, and lap guitar. The two tracks featuring the lap guitar are duets. The lovely raga-ish "Yaman Blues" features Mike Gangloff on tanpura, and the near-ragtime of "Linden Ave Stomp" features Glenn Jones on his vintage Gibson. The 12 page booklet reproduces the liner notes from both LP's and adds a few snaps for fun.
VHF Records

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Jack Rose / Silvester Anfang, Split (Funeral Folk, 2007)

A1 Jack Rose - How Green Was My Valley
A2 Jack Rose - Buckdancer's Choice
B Silvester Anfang - Geen Vlaemsch, Geen Senzen

Split entre Jack Rose et Silvester Anfang, groupe belge se définissant lui même comme du krautfolk post-satanique. Ici Jack Rose reprend le "How Green was my Valley" de John Fahey et le "Buckdancer's Choice" de Sam McGee, selon sa technique éprouvée du fingerpicking et c'est comme si chacun de ses petits doigts étaient animés de sa vie propre. Quant à Silvester Anfang ils signent à nouveau un morceau de free folk foutraque....

The first thing that strikes you about this split tour 7" from guitar maestro Jack Rose and Belgian occultists Silvester Anfang is the eerie sleeve art, bringing to mind the diabolical engravings in that book from The Ninth Gate. Entirely in keeping with that tone is the all-out creepfest 'Geen Vlaemsch, Geen Senzen' on the Anfang side, one of the group's more concise statements to date, held together by creaky string drones and out of step drumming. Jack Rose supplies two solo pieces, the first being a rendition of John Fahey's 'How Green Was My Valley', immaculately plucked out on lapsteel, the second a more blues-oriented fingerpicking of Sam McGee's 'Buckdancer's Choice'. Superb.
Boomkat

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Jack Rose - I Do Play Rock And Roll (Three Lobed Recordings, 2008)

1 Calais To Dover (13:20)
2 Cathedral Et Chartres (5:55)
3 Sundogs (22:10)

Membre de Pelt, groupe légendaire dont on finira bien par mettre quelques travaux sur ce blog, Jack Rose signe ici son premier album de matériel live. Sa maîtrise du fingerpicking en fait le digne héritier de John Fahey et de Robbie Basho...

The title might seem defensive, or just plain mystifying. The music that acoustic guitarist Jack Rose, formerly of Pelt, has played in recent years derives more from old country blues and various folk revivals than Elvis Presley, Black Flag, or Parts & Labor. Is he asserting that he can still rock just like he used to when Pelt sounded like the Dead C with a Virginia accent? Or is he just messing with us? Rose doesn’t really need to confuse or confound; his fingers are as strong as a pit bull’s jaws and you can hear it in the way his strings ring out. His music is singularly unapologetic; steeped in the sweaty-browed intensity of Delta picking and the cosmic sweep of Takoma Records stalwarts like John Fahey and Robbie Basho, it simply is what it is. So maybe “I do play rock and roll” is just a statement—of fact, since I know this guy has packed some classic rock sides for long car trips, or intent, given the undeniable physical impact or his playing.

Or maybe it’s the preamble to the phrase “and I used to play it like this.” Because whatever you want to call what he does now, this isn’t it. Rose has traversed a lot of ground between the impressionist meanderings on his first LP, Red Horse, White Mule and the succinct, tradition-steeped tunes on his most recent album, Dr. Ragtime And His Pals, and he’s ready to retire the music heard on this live CD (part of Three Lobed’s Oscilation III subscription series). The first two songs can be heard in different versions on Kensington Blues, and both are sweeping, romantic fantasias that owe a lot to Basho. Rose plays the regal “Calais to Dover” on a twelve-string, an instrument he doesn’t even own anymore because he’s said everything he has to say on it. This piece says a lot. Its opening strums sound momentous, dramatic, but it is drama wrung dry of pomp. They’re followed by spiraling figures that flow and eddy as inexorably as a mountain stream swollen by a spring thaw. It is music to get lost in.

“Cathedral et Chartres” is the more pensive composition, and is heard here in a six-string version that is darker in tone, if not spirit, than the Kensington version. Nowadays Rose seems eager to get to the point and nail whatever it is he’s playing; these tracks show that he could find something pretty marvelous by searching in someone else’s territory. “Sundogs” reaches back even farther into Rose’s personal history, but to his days in Pelt, particularly during their Hillbilly Theater of Eternal Music phase. There is no tune here, just pure, drifting sound, over twenty minutes of high-frequency shimmer coaxed from his Weissenborn lap steel braided with what sounds like a thin, unbroken ribbon of microphone feedback. If Eliane Radigue played acoustic guitar instead of ARP synthesizer, she might come up with something like this.

It might seem like a shame that Rose is walking away from music like this, and I can’t say I’d complain if he returned to it. But it’s testimony to his fidelity to his restless muse that he can set down something that someone else would turn into a career in order to see where it takes him.
By Bill Meyer, Dusted Reviews

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