Milwaukee post-rock combo Pele was formed in 1997 by guitarist Chris Rosenau, bassist Scott Schoenbeck and drummer Jon Mueller; two weeks before recording their debut record Teaching the History of Teaching Geography, the trio recruited former Promise Ring member Scott Beschta to play keyboards, ultimately the dominant musical element both of the LP and its companion remix disc People Living with Animals. Animals Kill People. After the sessions were completed, Schoenbeck agreed to assume Beschta's onetime bass duties in the Promise Ring, with Beschta himself moving on to other projects as well; the remaining duo of Rosenau and Mueller recruited bassist Matt Tennessen, with whom they'd worked in a pre-Pele group dubbed Tussin, to record 1999's Elephant and 2000's The Nudes. After issuing these intense and complex records, Pele took time away from recording to play live and keep writing. By the fall of 2002, Enemies (which was recorded in a women's shower room) was released on the Polyvinyl Records label. In 2004 the band called it quits, but the members continued in other projects: Rosenau, Mueller, and laptopist Jon Minor performed as Collections of Colonies of Bees; and Tennessen played with Paris, Texas. In 2009, the anthology A Scuttled Bender in a Watery Closet looked back at the band's seven years and 13 releases. ~ Jason Ankeny, Rovi