Send "Josh T. Pearson " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 In the early 2000s, Lift to Experience burst out of the Denton, Texas, scene with The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads, a mind-bogglingly ambitious double LP about the metaphysical juncture between the Lone Star State and the Middle East. Amid all the praise for the spiraling guitars and heady lyrical mythologies, the band quietly dissolved, as if it had already said everything it needed to say. Frontman Josh T. Pearson disappeared for several years, then emerged in Germany playing intimate, barely scripted shows that blended American Primitive guitar playing (think John Fahey) with quasi-Biblical lyrics (think Wovenhand). His music had grown quieter and more ruminative, eventually winning such fans as Dirty Three and Natasha Khan, who corralled him to play and sing on Bat for Lashes' Fur and Gold.Like a slasher villain knocking off teens on the anniversary of his death, Pearson is releasing his solo debut almost 10 years after Lift to Experience's sole album release. Somewhat self-aggrandizingly titled Last of the Country Gentlemen, it was recorded in just two nights in Berlin, with Pearson doing live takes to the capture the wooly extemporaneity of his live shows. In fact, the album's most intriguing quality may be the strong impression that tracks like "Country Dumb" and "Sorry With a Song" are never the same from one performance to the next. These recordings capture fleeting moments in the lives of the songs, no more definitive than any other versions, and that gives the album a weird, stars-barely-aligned precariousness. That unrehearsed quality relies more on Pearson's guitar playing than on his singing or songwriting. A dexterous picker, he accompanies himself loosely, unleashing a flurry of notes on opener "Thou Art Loosed" or roughly alluding to a melody on "Woman, When I've Raised Hell". There's an intriguing friction between his playing and his singing, as the tempos and dynamics change abruptly to generate an undercurrent of uneasiness. On the other hand, Pearson sounds like he's just making it all up as he goes along-- as if he has no other mission beyond the present moment. So he rambles and drones, drawing songs out beyond the 10-minute mark for no discernible reason and indulging humorless lyrical conceits. With its antiquated postcard title and hangdog self-seriousness, "Honeymoon's Great! Wish You Were Her" staggers around for 13 minutes, while "Sweetheart I Ain't Your Christ" collapses under the weight of its stilted language: "I ain't your savior or your Christ or your goddamn sacrifice," he sings. "And when I said I'd give my life, I weren't talking suicide." Pearson keeps going and going, treating your attention like a given instead a gift....full text |
| Guardian |
| Best known for Lift to Experience's 2001 cult classic The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads – which, just before 9/11, prophesied the end of the world – Josh T Pearson has spent the following decade losing his faith and his mind in Tehuacana, Texas, and spending months in bed. Somehow, he found time to pen a handful of songs documenting – but, of course – the collapse of a brief, ill-fated marriage. Those songs – with titles such as Sweetheart, I Ain't Your Christ – are as troubled as you'd expect, with the preacher's son conjuring clouds of intensity from mostly just plucked guitar and his ravaged Jeff Buckley of a vocal. The violin-assisted Woman, When I Raise Hell sounds like a brilliant, disturbed relation of Bruce Springsteen's haunted Nebraska, although elsewhere, 13-minute trawls through Pearson's innermost feelings and failings, with lines such as "I'm in love with an amazing woman, she just is not my wife", make for uncomfortable listening....full text |
| Drownedinsound |
| How do you crystallise the ragged, shattered fragments of heartbreak into musical figure and form? The thin, indistinct, practically invisible line dividing genuine catharsis from over-sentimental blustering has always been the ultimate meridian for singer-songwriters. And given that human emotion is by its very nature given to hyperbole and overwrought avowals, the ability to temper this while still maintaining a hand over your heart provides a challenge befitting only the brave and the brilliant. Avoiding the potholes of self-indulgence, petty jealousy, bitterness to create something genuinely beautiful and affecting is a nearly impossible task. Precious few succeed. Speaking of hearts, heaven or hell only knows what beguiling creature caused Josh T. Pearson to pluck his from his chest whilst writing Last of the Country Gentlemen. But it’s fairly safe to say she must have been something rare and special. The former frontman of lauded outfit Lift to Experience, Pearson spontaneously and unexpectedly quit music after their sole album, 2001’s sprawling The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads and retreated back to his homeland, finding solace and sanctuary in menial jobs, playing guitar for meagre fees at local bars before eventually making his way back, step by careful step. But it’s clear there’s been some pain along the way. His debut release eschews the atmospheric, shoegaze fog that characterised Lift to Experience in favour of a cloud of fluttering arpeggios, brutal and beautiful acoustic guitar and Pearson’s distinctive voice; part sob, part whisper, part growl, part lullaby. It is an epic journey of emotion through the bleak, torn landscape of a broken heart. And though filled with sorrow, it is nevertheless quite, quite magnificent to behold. From the gilded shimmer and remorseful falsetto of opener 'Thou Art Loosed', with Pearson proclaiming “I’m off to save the world… at least I can hope”, it’s clear that something remarkable is afoot. ‘Sweetheart, I Ain’t Your Christ’ is the album's first epic: an 11 minute metaphysical conceit combining secular desire and religious devotion, which suddenly morphs in structure and tone midway through, becoming more angry and despairing as Pearson desperately searches for a solution for a relationship he already knows to be doomed. ‘Woman, When I’ve Raised Hell’ is a more standard, sorrowful country ballad but comes gloriously bedecked with strings and climactic swells of choking sound. The sound of the record is captivating: equal parts sparse, minimalist whisper and emotional overwhelm. The conflict and confusion between the two are what makes for such an intense, perfectly lit stage amidst which the tragedy can be unfurled....full text |
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