Rod Poole 1962-2007
At one time Rod and I were very close friends. He gave me some very valuable guitar lessons and taught me techniques and exercizes that I still use to this day. He helped me out quite a bit with my gear back when Medicine was first starting out. His old pals from back home in Oxford in the band Swervedriver took us on tour partly due to his enthusiasm. He also made the beautiful live recording of Electric Company that I used on the "Creative Playthings" disc.
Have a listen to the full 40 minute live solo guitar piece that is linked to when you click on the picture and send your loving energy to Rod as he transitions out of this world sooner than he had planned.
Guitarist Rod Poole pushed the envelope on music
In the wake of his tragic death, friends remember 'a true artist' who loved to explore new sounds.
By Greg Burk
Special to The Times
May 19, 2007
Guitarist Jim McAuley had no trouble this week recalling his first meeting with fellow guitarist Rod Poole. It was at the home of Nels Cline, well before the three recorded their "Acoustic Guitar Trio" album.
"I was standing in Nels' kitchen, sipping coffee, when these amazing crystalline tones emerged from the living room," McAuley said. "Rod Poole was just tuning up, and already I was mesmerized by his sound."
Cline, a key player in L.A.'s experimental music scene and now a member of Wilco, described Poole as "a true artist, probably a genius" in a note on his website, posted after Poole was stabbed to death on Sunday in the parking lot of Mel's Drive-In.
His wife, Lisa Ladaw-Poole, was there when it happened.
The couple was walking toward the restaurant, after attending a concert at the Dangerous Curve art gallery downtown, when a car nearly struck them and other pedestrians. The musician spoke up; the vehicle's driver and passenger both got out, the latter allegedly with a knife, according to police. A half hour later, Poole died.
A security camera provided images that led to the quick arrest of Michael and Angela Sheridan. They were arraigned Wednesday.
Ladaw-Poole fielded a lot of phone calls this week, many of them from the parents of Poole's guitar students who hadn't gotten the news and were wondering why he didn't show up for their children's guitar lessons.
"These children loved Rod," Ladaw-Poole said Wednesday. "He was really kind with them."
Poole was a highly unusual guitarist, equally drawn to the distorted sound bombs of Jimi Hendrix and the spontaneous microcosmic tracings of Derek Bailey.
"I never could quite figure out how one man with one guitar could generate such an all-enveloping aural space," said Devin Sarno, an electronic drone artist who recorded Poole twice for Sarno's W.I.N. label.
Having left his native England in 1989 to find a more exploratory climate, Poole fell in with a devoted cloister of Los Angeles pathfinders that included Kraig Grady, Brad Laner and Motor Totemist Guild.
Grady, who composes in microtonal scales that employ the frequencies between Western music's traditional 12 tones, introduced Poole to his own mentor, Erv Wilson. Wilson is a pioneer in microtonal music and "just" intonation, which tunes to vibrations' natural mathematical ratios rather than the tempered scales used in orchestras.
Never one to take halfway measures, Poole lived in Wilson's house for more than five years and emerged with his own way of hearing.
He had a Martin guitar re-fretted to 17 tones and, using his already precise, shaded finger-picking technique, began improvising trance-bound variations on spacious arpeggios that could extend until time vanished.
Poole's solo, group and bowed-guitar recordings have appeared on the W.I.N., Transparency and Incus labels (the last being Bailey's imprint).
Poole's music was the first and last thing heard Wednesday on KXLU-FM's (88.9) "Trilogy" show, this night hosted by old Motor Totemist friends Emily Hay and Lynn Johnston.
Pinging and plucking, gently contracting and expanding, with "just" harmonies fluttering their intangible physicality throughout, the improvisation exuded an uncanny sense of peace. In contrast to its quiet beauty, it was titled "The Death Adder."
Earlier in the day, Johnston described Poole as "a low-key guy — he was only in your face about music."
Two words that surfaced repeatedly when people talked about Poole's artistic temperament were "passion" and "intensity."
Experimental guitarist Jeremy Drake, a curator of the "Sound" concerts at Schindler House in West Hollywood, wrote on a Poole tribute site: "Rod was always fully present. Good mood or bad, you got the full Rod Poole experience whenever he was in the room."
Cindy Bernard, a primary "Sound" series organizer, said Poole was extremely meticulous about the many recordings he engineered for the series' archive: "It's rare to know someone whose enthusiasm for music is so pure."
Instrumentalist and composer Vinny Golia, long the most pervasive influence in this city's edge-music community, agreed. Poole once recorded a performance Golia had done with German bassist Peter Kowald. When Golia wanted a copy, Poole broke down his equipment, carried it over to Golia's house and made the transfer there, not wanting to take any chances that the copy wouldn't be perfectly compatible with Golia's system.
Guitarist Carey Fosse, who knew Poole mainly in Poole's transitional period of the early '90s, called him "a wonderful improviser, very disciplined, and with beautiful articulation. I think his technique led him to areas he hadn't imagined."
Poole had been disappointed by the lack of opportunities to play forward-thinking music in Los Angeles. Though he had made few live appearances for several years, Bailey's death in late 2005 inspired him to help fill what he felt to be an artistic gap.
Poole's wife said he had been working on "just"-intonated interpretations of Irish folk songs, and that the noted film sound mixer Giovanni Di Simone had made new recordings of him.
Grady recently received an invitation to perform at a microtonal festival in Germany and was asked if he could help extend the offer to Poole.
He will be there in spirit.
Ladaw-Poole said she will take her husband's ashes back to England. A memorial service is being planned.
9 Comments:
http://www.biink.com/poole
Roderick, or should I say Wodewick:
Well, mate, it's time to fare thee well, adieu, so long, and all the best to you.
It's hard to believe that you've flown the coop, it seems like you were just here, chuckling over the Derek & Clive send up of Fireball XL5.
Thanks for all the good memories: S.H.A.D.O. Dinky toys, burning the chalice with Sun Ra's Arkestra, your vigorous defence of vinyl versus digital, you ringing me up @ KPFK @ 330am, thanking me for playing "Yoo Doo Right" by Can, while you were zooming around on the freeway system in your Dodge Colt.
I'm still glad that you liked my shepherd's pie so much, you came back for more. Thanks for letting me record you, back in the old days with King Dahl, Lynn Johnston, and Tim Crockett. Many, many thanks for the unreleased AMM recordings. I'm honoured to have learned from you about just intonation, microtonality, and Pythagoras.
Thanks for your humourous observations about West Los Angeles, New York City, and Poole, Dorset. Remember when we went to Berkeley to see Derek Bailey? And what happened to all those photos that I took of the two of you, together, two geezers enjoying the California sunshine. Thanks for all your expressions, like "Pretty Damn Good", or PDG, for short.
Thanks for tolerating my short-lived foray into electro-acoustic sound with David Poyourow. Thanks for turning me on to Joseph Spence, from the Bahamas. And thanks for sharing all the cups of tea together.
Remember when we found those ancient unreleased movie posters for Rainbow Bridge? And those cool flyers for the "Pyle O' Shytt" party in Wales? Remember when I explained the significance of "Studebaker Hawk" to you?
I wish I had a penny for all the times we disagreed on virtually anything. I'd be rich then, me boyo.
All The Best
B. Watusi
.'.93.'.
I read about Rod today in the Times and I was shocked and saddened by this tragic news. I knew Rod years ago when my boyfriend Spencer played drums for him. He was a nice guy for sure. I hope to hear about the plans for his Memorial Service. Blessings and Condolences to his wife and family. He will be missed.
Voxx
I first met Rod in 1989. I had been doing guitar repair work for Carey Fosse and I beleive he refered Rod to me at the time. I had seen Just intonated instruments previously but had never worked on them before Rod had approached me. Apparently he had gone to another shop in town that had not taken his need for perfection seriously and we planned to then replace & refret the fingerboard on the Martin that became his signature guitar. Rod was an absoulute perfectionist but a joy to work with because he had a conviction to his work & music that made the job worth doing. There were a few more changes in some fret positions till we settled on what you see now but he would chuckle a little when he would talk about moving another fret and I would act like I was pulling my hair out! Rod was intense, engaged funny and a genious. We had always great conversations about music , gear and just anything.It is an absolute pitty that two idiots can take a life that means so much to so many people.I am truly honered to have known him and worked for him
Floods of memories, from our teens till he left.
The first album he played me was Funkadelic, but soon moved on to Zappa. I played him Fripp and Eno.
Sharing a house and teaching him to shop for sensible food. The supermarket where he stuck his cheeky grin round the end of the aisle and asked "mooooooose?" ( I still say it at least once a week and it still makes me smile) (and always will).
The week he decided to start collecting Grateful Dead bootlegs and the 3 months of listening to nothing but.
Walking round Oxford in the winter in his huge greatcoat with his huge hair on top. Nights beyond number with Matt and Buzz and Kate and Alex, mesmerised by his music (which he called "intellectual wanking").
There was a party at Kate and Alex's 4 storey house, people everywhere. We were in a room on the top floor, escaping the early 80's student music downstairs, listening to the rich gentle sounds Rod was playing (he was tuning up) when he asked me to get him a spoon. Down to the basement kitchen I went, but by the time I returned I had to fight my way back in, it was so crowded. Soon everyone was crowded round the door as, for over an hour, Rod enraptured the entire party by playing with a spoon.
I know little of his time in the States other than his early problems. We both kept moving and lost touch. I know even less about the technicalities of his music, I just know he was the best musician I could ever hope to meet.
A crap housemate, but a very special friend.
Please can I have details of the memorial service?
andy(the at bit)51055.com
What an unbelievable tragedy. I knew Rod in Oxford through the 80s and before he left for LA. Then we all moved around and got into different things and lost touch.
He was a fantastic musician and I'm glad he could grow and flourish in LA - a bigger world than the Oxford he inhabited in our day.
Apart from the guitar playing which was mesmorising even then, I mainly remember his specific requirements for one kind of baked beans (which one?): no other would do.
I often wondered how he was getting on in LA and whether he could find the beans he liked.
Love to you Rod and all those you've left behind and who are missing you.
khellin@onetel.com
I met Rod Poole in 1979. He was already outstandingly talented and utterly single-minded about his music. I tried to persuade him to answer an ad for a guitarist, which Def Leppard had placed in a trade paper. Rod would have breezed through the audition. Aged barely 18, skint and completely unknown, what could he have to lose? Naturally, Rod would have none of it. Things were done his way or not at all. During the 1980s Rod and I shared a house in Oxford, where we got up to all kinds of high-jinks. He introduced me to music which I may never have heard otherwise (step forward Sun Ra). In Greece 1986 we climbed up Mount Olympus with Marc Burgess and got seriously lost on the way, by taking the wrong path. Rod insisted on taking his guitar up to the peak and playing it when he got there, with a distant view over Albania. I believe a tape of this event still exists somewhere. In 1998 I went to visit Rod and Lisa in LA. They seemed happy and Rod was carving out his musical niche. I didn't see Rod so often after that, although every now and then I'd get a parcel containing a rare vinyl album, which Rod knew I wanted and had managed to unearth from somewhere. Its very sad that Rod has become a victim of this random violence, which increasingly defines the so-called free and civilised world. Fortunately, as we all know, "the present day compose refuses to die"!.
The brand of baked beans that Rod was so passionate about was Crosse & Blackwells - and he really was VERY insistent that they were the best brand. Needless to say, and somewhat ridiculously, he was proved absolutely right and lots of us in Oxford switched over to that brand!
I first met Rod sometime around 1984/85 I would say, and after the pub we would all pile around the house he shared Matt Screech and Richard Mason, all quite merry, and within minutes find ourselves stoned and hypnotised by strange sounds coming from either Rod's speakers or his guitar's soundbox.
But Rod really could play electric guitar like Hendrix too and we once coaxed him 'out of retirement' on thaqt count for a party on a hillside in Wales where myself and Paddy Pulzer would play the Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell parts on an improvisational reading of Machine Gun - at least we would have if I hadn't got too drunk to play.. the rehearsals were great though!
There are other tales to tell - finding out that John Fahey was alive and well and playing a show at the Town & Country Club in London we all travelled up to see him play.. Rod wasn't drinking alcohol at that time, and was very much against anyone drinking whilst performing but we discovered that Fahey certainly enjoyed a drink or two whilst playing! Fahey was a huge influence on Rod and I think he lightened up on the alcohol thing a little after that show..
We always caught up with Rod in LA when Swervedriver was playing and I last saw Rod a couple of years back with Lisa at my friends' Karl and Helen's place in Santa Monica.
Rod shall be greatly missed and as someone mentioned earlier, knowing him was Pretty Damn Good.
Adam Franklin
Tribute to Rod Poole
By Brent Bloom
My fondest memories of Rod Poole were back in the music business days of Hollywood, California. I was living at 801 N Las Palmas in Waring Manor and eventually met Rod in the late 90s, who lived downstairs. We became friends that shared optimater, incense, and hours of very late night music in my apartment upstairs. We listened to “Jump on Top of Me, Baby” by the Stones many of times, and Rod would always say, “That is the real band!” The time spent listening was a great experience because Rod showed me so many new historical perspectives of Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac, The Flying Burrito Brothers/Gram Parsons, Sun Ra, true old school Ska/Reggae (Lee Perry), Prince Buster, John Fahey, Leo Kothe—simply 6- and 12-string guitar!
I was always knocking on his door, seeing him in his plush blue robe with the kettle always going off, food being prepared or the empty can of baked beans, and talking and listening to “Live at Leeds” – vinyl versus new extensions on CD! The days of Rhino Records, Saturday vinyl sales, or conquering Aarons! Those days are memories that a monetary state will never understand, and we barely got by, but money could be found for music and fine German malt liquor beer. Seeing him perform at that old, tiny Hollywood theatre or in his apartment –we both had problems dealing with the outside noise of Las Palmas and Waring. Discussing Hendrix, Zeppelin, Zappa, the blues in general, was amazing. As a friend, Rob helped me survive in Hollywood when I was preparing to leave the music business back before MP3, downloading, early DVD. Rod was there for me, and all that was on our brains was vinyl, books, and historical perspectives of all avenues!
One of the last people I said goodbye to was Rod—we drank a few beers on top of Waring Manor and my road was back home. It has been nine years since the departure, but our friendship continued on a phone level that I will deeply miss. My regret is that the last time we talked was in September, when I returned from a Blues festival in Grafton, Wisconsin. Paramount recorded some historical 78rpm discs there. We conversed for awhile and, as friends, always shared stories together.
A week before Rod’s death, Les Paul was in his hometown of Waukesha, Wisconsin. Now I regret not sharing this experience with Rod. Rod, you will be greatly missed by the world because you were an original in a not-so-original place called Hollywood. To have shared so many conversations together on the lost land line phone concept of meaningful exchange of ideas, history, philosophy, and life in general will be a void for many worldwide!
And I can’t forget our vinyl outings of “Exile on Main Street” many a late night, and Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac historical film on VHS. Those guys are loaded – no real playing, no real vocals – Hollywood. Not to mention Rainbow Bridge and sharing my dad’s copy of “The Monterey Pops Festival Program”, and “Gimme Shelter” (they hit Marty).
Garcia responds, “Bummer, man!”
Your laugh,
I raise my wine glass to a true original that made so much happen. You will be missed by me.
Cheers, mate,
Your friend,
Brent
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