Fruit from the Trees marks a sonically colorful release for Jack Van Cleaf’s debut melancholic folk record.
Rising indie artist Jack Van Cleaf has released his melancholic folk album, Fruit from the Trees, premiering on Atwood Magazine who described the debut as “a radiantly raw alt-folk reckoning in the depths of connection, emotion, and the human experience.” “These songs were written over the course of a seven-year period spanning from high school to early adulthood,” Van Cleaf says. Dreamy acoustic guitar and vocals that sway in gorgeous imagery from the lyrics create a top-to-bottom quality record for any folk lover – or any music lover, for that matter.
The album opens like a lost suitcase. Written across the last seven years, the ten tracks are stashed with fables and fictions, letters to high school lovers, loose change in foreign currency, and a white bandanna chalked in red Texas dust. The record’s first single, ‘Black & Blue,’ distinguishes itself with slow beauty and strong narrative command dressed in subtle harmonies and shimmering guitars. In ‘Cowboy,’ a guilt-ridden rogue’s romantic vision canters from fireside folk to anthemic rock, fit for the vast desert sky. The fan favorite and rumbling heartbeat of the record, ‘Rattlesnake,’ is struck by the overwhelming possibilities of living “drunk on freedom, stuck on choice.” And in ‘Wild Roses,’ the arrangement spreads out in sunlit brass while the lyrics write – as vivid as memory – of a Florentine spring love affair.
