Tanakh (band)
Encyclopedia
Tanakh is the name of a musical collective
from Richmond, Virginia
as well as a reference to the music produced by the group. The collective was formed in 2000 by its primary songwriter, producer and recording engineer Jesse Poe
.
at Sound of Music Studios to improve their recording skills. The two musicians would take turn recording each other after hours at the studio, using whatever instruments happened to be left around. This included many international instruments that Joan Osborne
had recently left in studio. They would layer track upon track taking turns recording while the other played, and vice versa; some recordings from this time appeared on the bonus CD with the band's 2002 debut album Villa Claustrophobia. They also composed and recorded the score for Andrew Carnwath
's silent film Greater Than Half which won the The Audience Choice Award at Bare Bones International and the Rosebud Film Festival in Washington, D.C.
The duo began to perform live using analogue loops created live on stage with old tape machines and half broken equipment they salvaged from the Sound of Music equipment graveyards and thrift stores. Frustrated with limitations of analogue looping, they enlisted the help of Jeff 'Sanford' Krones, who lived with Poe at the Pyramid Institute, an abandoned Shriners
Temple atop the collapsed Church Hill Tunnel
, and Pat Best of Pelt. This quartet formed the core of the original Tanakh collective, playing live shows and recording improvisations at the Pyramid Institute and Sound of Music Studios along with many guests who joined performances as they were available.
Inspired in part by John Zorn
's Tzadik
label, Poe and Murphy's original idea was to provide a name that they could perform under and that anyone who they liked to play could perform or record under, with their dream being that there might be two or three Tanakh shows at the same time in different geographic locations. The band's self-titled 2004 EP on Alien8 Recordings
came from a Pyramid Institute performance recorded by Bryan Hoffa who would later start a band Broken Hips with Murphy on guitar, and various instruments. This instrumental double disc was later mixed and mastered by King Crimson
engineer Ronan Chris Murphy.
After initial plans to record a studio effort fell through due to other commitments, Poe worked as an engineer in Berlin at the Schaubu:hne am Halleschen Ufer before returning to record Villa Claustrophobia with Brian Paulson
as engineer and with previous Tanakh guest performers such as the Dirty Three
's Mick Turner
, Anomoanon/Palace member Ned Oldham and Ravi Shankar associate Nirmal Bajekal. Via Turner and Oldham's brother Will Oldham
, members of Godspeed You! Black Emperor
heard the album, leading Montreal label Alien8 to contact Poe and sign Tanakh. Villa Claustrophobia was released in April 2002 to a variety of positive reviews, including Mark Richardson in Pitchfork Media
and Ian Penman
in The Wire
.
Various line-ups of Tanakh performed and toured from this point forward, with a new key member being bassist/singer Michele Poulos, who Poe met around the time of Villa Claustrophobias release. Poe, Poulos and a further core group of performers, including Agents of Good Roots
drummer Brian Jones and guests Jim White and Sparklehorse
associate/producer Alan Weatherhead, recorded the band's third full album Dieu Deuil, released in early 2004 on Alien8.
Poe relocated to Italy prior to the release of Dieu Deuil after the offer of an ESL teaching job in Florence; further Tanakh performances and tours were based out that city for the next few years. Most of Tanakh's forth album, 2006's Ardent Fevers, was written in Italy but recorded in Richmond by Hoffa during a return visit to the city in the summer of 2004. Guest performers on Ardent Fevers included Isobel Campbell
and Alex Neilson
, who had been introduced to Poe by Alasdair Roberts after the two had played shows together in Scotland.
Taken from the same recording period as the Ardent Fevers sessions, Tanakh's fifth album, the 2007 release Saunders Hollow, was distinctly different from the collective's previous work in that Poulos was the lead vocalist throughout, with Poe concentrating on producing and performing and Hoffa once again recording an expanded lineup of the band, again featuring Campbell and Neilson as guest performers. Saunders Hollow was also unique in being released on Australian label Camera Obscura
rather than Alien8, home to all the band's previous releases.
Other than singles on compilations, no further Tanakh releases have appeared since Saunders Hollow but the collective has continued to perform irregularly, including the opening set at the sixth Terrastock
festival in Providence, Rhode Island in April 2006 and a one-off performance at the seventh Terrastock festival in Louisville, Kentucky in June 2008. This latter performance featured a unique lineup of Poe, Acid Mothers Temple
lead figure Kawabata Makoto
and members of Abunai!
and United Bible Studies
.
As of summer 2010 Poe is reported to be working on a series of collaborative singles; it is not certain if they will appear under the Tanakh name.
Musical collective
Musical collective is a phrase used to describe a group of musicians in which membership is flexible and creative control is shared. Such entities have transitioned from the traditional hierarchical configuration that features either a frontman , or a plurality of band members in tension for...
from Richmond, Virginia
Richmond, Virginia
Richmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...
as well as a reference to the music produced by the group. The collective was formed in 2000 by its primary songwriter, producer and recording engineer Jesse Poe
Jesse Poe
Jesse Poe is a songwriter and primary member of Tanakh, the musical collective. He spent a decade in Virginia, beginning in 1993; the first half of the decade was spent in Blacksburg, and relocated to Richmond where he met David Lowery and several Sound of Music Studios stalwarts.In 2003, he moved...
.
Background
Poe and Phil Murphy were then working as apprentices under John MorandJohn Morand
John Morand is a US based record producer, engineer and studio owner.He works at Sound of Music Studios in Richmond, Virginia, US and has produced numerous records together with David Lowery.-Bands:* Sparklehorse* Anton Walgrave* Neeka...
at Sound of Music Studios to improve their recording skills. The two musicians would take turn recording each other after hours at the studio, using whatever instruments happened to be left around. This included many international instruments that Joan Osborne
Joan Osborne
Joan Elizabeth Osborne is an American singer-songwriter. She is best known for her song "One of Us". She has toured with Motown sidemen the Funk Brothers and was featured in the documentary film about them, Standing in the Shadows of Motown.-Biography:Originally from Anchorage, Kentucky, a suburb...
had recently left in studio. They would layer track upon track taking turns recording while the other played, and vice versa; some recordings from this time appeared on the bonus CD with the band's 2002 debut album Villa Claustrophobia. They also composed and recorded the score for Andrew Carnwath
Andrew Carnwath
Sir Andrew Hunter Carnwath KCVO DL was a British banker. He was Managing Director, Baring Brothers & Co. Ltd, 1955–1974; and Chairman of the London Multinational Bank, 1971–1974- References :...
's silent film Greater Than Half which won the The Audience Choice Award at Bare Bones International and the Rosebud Film Festival in Washington, D.C.
The duo began to perform live using analogue loops created live on stage with old tape machines and half broken equipment they salvaged from the Sound of Music equipment graveyards and thrift stores. Frustrated with limitations of analogue looping, they enlisted the help of Jeff 'Sanford' Krones, who lived with Poe at the Pyramid Institute, an abandoned Shriners
Shriners
The Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, also commonly known as Shriners and abbreviated A.A.O.N.M.S., established in 1870, is an appendant body to Freemasonry, based in the United States...
Temple atop the collapsed Church Hill Tunnel
Church Hill Tunnel
Church Hill Tunnel is an old Chesapeake and Ohio Railway tunnel extending for approximately 4,000 feet under the Church Hill section of Richmond, Virginia. Built in the early 1870s, in 1925, the tunnel collapsed on a work train killing four and trapping a steam locomotive and some flat cars...
, and Pat Best of Pelt. This quartet formed the core of the original Tanakh collective, playing live shows and recording improvisations at the Pyramid Institute and Sound of Music Studios along with many guests who joined performances as they were available.
Inspired in part by John Zorn
John Zorn
John Zorn is an American avant-garde composer, arranger, record producer, saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist. Zorn is a prolific artist: he has hundreds of album credits as performer, composer, or producer...
's Tzadik
Tzadik
Tzadik/Zadik/Sadiq is a title given to personalities in Jewish tradition considered righteous, such as Biblical figures and later spiritual masters. The root of the word ṣadiq, is ṣ-d-q , which means "justice" or "righteousness", also the root of Tzedakah...
label, Poe and Murphy's original idea was to provide a name that they could perform under and that anyone who they liked to play could perform or record under, with their dream being that there might be two or three Tanakh shows at the same time in different geographic locations. The band's self-titled 2004 EP on Alien8 Recordings
Alien8 Recordings
Alien8 Recordings is an independent record label founded in 1996 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The music label was founded by Sean O'Hara and Gary Worsley...
came from a Pyramid Institute performance recorded by Bryan Hoffa who would later start a band Broken Hips with Murphy on guitar, and various instruments. This instrumental double disc was later mixed and mastered by King Crimson
King Crimson
King Crimson are a rock band founded in London, England in 1969. Often categorised as a foundational progressive rock group, the band have incorporated diverse influences and instrumentation during their history...
engineer Ronan Chris Murphy.
After initial plans to record a studio effort fell through due to other commitments, Poe worked as an engineer in Berlin at the Schaubu:hne am Halleschen Ufer before returning to record Villa Claustrophobia with Brian Paulson
Brian Paulson
Brian Paulson is a musician, record producer and audio engineer from Minnesota, best known for recording albums by Slint, Uncle Tupelo, Son Volt and Wilco....
as engineer and with previous Tanakh guest performers such as the Dirty Three
Dirty Three
Dirty Three are an instrumental trio consisting of Warren Ellis , Mick Turner and Jim White , originating from Melbourne, Australia. Since the Dirty Three formed in 1992, they have spent a lot of time overseas...
's Mick Turner
Mick Turner
Mick Turner is an Australian musician and painter best known as the guitarist for Dirty Three.Prior to his work with Dirty Three, Turner was a member of several Melbourne-based rock bands: Sick Things , The Moodists , Fungus Brains , and Venom P...
, Anomoanon/Palace member Ned Oldham and Ravi Shankar associate Nirmal Bajekal. Via Turner and Oldham's brother Will Oldham
Will Oldham
Will Oldham , better known by the stage name Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, is an American singer-songwriter and actor. From 1993 to 1997, he performed and recorded under variations of the Palace name, including the Palace Brothers, Palace Songs, and Palace Music...
, members of Godspeed You! Black Emperor
Godspeed You! Black Emperor
Godspeed You! Black Emperor is a Canadian post-rock band which originated from Montreal, Quebec in 1994...
heard the album, leading Montreal label Alien8 to contact Poe and sign Tanakh. Villa Claustrophobia was released in April 2002 to a variety of positive reviews, including Mark Richardson in Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
and Ian Penman
Ian Penman
Ian Penman is a British writer and, latterly, blogger. He began writing for the NME in the autumn of 1977, later contributing to various publications including Uncut, Arena, The Wire, The Face, The Guardian, The Times, The Sunday Times, The Independent, Screen and German Vogue.Many of Penman's...
in The Wire
The Wire (magazine)
The Wire is a British avant garde music magazine, founded in 1982 by jazz promoter Anthony Wood and journalist Chrissie Murray. The magazine initially concentrated on contemporary jazz and improvised music, but branched out in the early 1990s to various types of experimental music...
.
Various line-ups of Tanakh performed and toured from this point forward, with a new key member being bassist/singer Michele Poulos, who Poe met around the time of Villa Claustrophobias release. Poe, Poulos and a further core group of performers, including Agents of Good Roots
Agents of Good Roots
Agents of Good Roots was an American rock band from Richmond, Virginia.The group formed in 1995 and toured heavily on college campuses in the middle of the decade. They independently released two records before signing to RCA Records, after which they toured with Dave Matthews Band and scored two...
drummer Brian Jones and guests Jim White and Sparklehorse
Sparklehorse
Sparklehorse was an American indie rock band led by the singer and multi-instrumentalist Mark Linkous.-History:Sparklehorse's first album, Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot featuring Bob Rupe of the Silos and Cracker, was a modest college radio success...
associate/producer Alan Weatherhead, recorded the band's third full album Dieu Deuil, released in early 2004 on Alien8.
Poe relocated to Italy prior to the release of Dieu Deuil after the offer of an ESL teaching job in Florence; further Tanakh performances and tours were based out that city for the next few years. Most of Tanakh's forth album, 2006's Ardent Fevers, was written in Italy but recorded in Richmond by Hoffa during a return visit to the city in the summer of 2004. Guest performers on Ardent Fevers included Isobel Campbell
Isobel Campbell
Isobel Campbell is a Scottish singer, cellist and composer in the indie and rock genres.-History:Campbell was a member of Belle & Sebastian from their formation in Glasgow in 1996 until 2002, when she departed the band for personal reasons. She played cello and keyboards with the band, and sang...
and Alex Neilson
Alex Neilson
Alex Neilson is an English drummer, percussionist and singer who is currently based in Glasgow but grew up in Leeds. He has performed alongside a large number of bands and artists including Lucky Luke, The One Ensemble Of Daniel Padden, Ashtray Navigations, Alastair Galbraith, Isobel Campbell,...
, who had been introduced to Poe by Alasdair Roberts after the two had played shows together in Scotland.
Taken from the same recording period as the Ardent Fevers sessions, Tanakh's fifth album, the 2007 release Saunders Hollow, was distinctly different from the collective's previous work in that Poulos was the lead vocalist throughout, with Poe concentrating on producing and performing and Hoffa once again recording an expanded lineup of the band, again featuring Campbell and Neilson as guest performers. Saunders Hollow was also unique in being released on Australian label Camera Obscura
Camera Obscura (record label)
Camera Obscura was a record label founded by Australian music journalist Tony Dale in 1996. Described by Dale as 'a conduit for the release of contemporary acid-folk, psych-pop and space-rock,' the label put out almost ninety releases over fourteen years, the vast majority of which were...
rather than Alien8, home to all the band's previous releases.
Other than singles on compilations, no further Tanakh releases have appeared since Saunders Hollow but the collective has continued to perform irregularly, including the opening set at the sixth Terrastock
Terrastock
Terrastock is a music festival organised periodically by Phil McMullen, formerly editor of the Ptolemaic Terrascope and since 2005 the publisher of the Terrascope Online website. The event typically features independent bands playing psychedelic rock....
festival in Providence, Rhode Island in April 2006 and a one-off performance at the seventh Terrastock festival in Louisville, Kentucky in June 2008. This latter performance featured a unique lineup of Poe, Acid Mothers Temple
Acid Mothers Temple
Acid Mothers Temple & the Melting Paraiso U.F.O. is a Japanese psychedelic band, the core of which formed in 1995. The band is led by guitarist Kawabata Makoto and early in their career featured many musicians, but by 2004 the line-up had coalesced with only a few core members and frequent guest...
lead figure Kawabata Makoto
Kawabata Makoto
Kawabata Makoto is a Japanese musician and founding member of the band and "soul collective" Acid Mothers Temple.- Band history :Kawabata is chiefly famous for his leadership of Acid Mothers Temple and its variants; however, he has also played in many other bands since the start of his career in...
and members of Abunai!
Abunai!
Abunai! was a psychedelic rock/space rock/folk rock band from Boston, Massachusetts, USA primarily active from 1996 to 2001 on the Australian Camera Obscura record label.-History:...
and United Bible Studies
United Bible Studies
United Bible Studies is an experimental and improvisational folk band from Ireland. There are a few core members such as David Colohan as well as a host of incidental contributors on both the live performances and regular albums...
.
As of summer 2010 Poe is reported to be working on a series of collaborative singles; it is not certain if they will appear under the Tanakh name.
Discography
- Villa Claustrophobia (released April 2002 on Alien8 RecordingsAlien8 RecordingsAlien8 Recordings is an independent record label founded in 1996 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The music label was founded by Sean O'Hara and Gary Worsley...
) - Dieu Deuil (released January 28, 2004 on Alien8 Recordings)
- Tanakh EP (released September 20, 2004 on Alien8 Recordings)
- Ardent Fevers (released March 7, 2006 on Alien8 Recordings)
- Saunders Hollow (released February 14, 2007 on Camera ObscuraCamera Obscura (record label)Camera Obscura was a record label founded by Australian music journalist Tony Dale in 1996. Described by Dale as 'a conduit for the release of contemporary acid-folk, psych-pop and space-rock,' the label put out almost ninety releases over fourteen years, the vast majority of which were...
)
External links
- Tanakh bio, page hosted at Alien8 recordings, band's label
- Tanakh on MySpace
- Review of Saunders Hollow at Pitchfork MediaPitchfork MediaPitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...