The Olivia Tremor Control

As much an idea as a music group, the Olivia Tremor Control was perhaps one of the most visible and innovative people from the Elephant 6 collective, a coterie of like-minded, lo-fi indie groupings — like the Apples in Stereo system, Neutral Milk Resort, and Key Square — who shared music artists, suggestions, and sensibilities. The Olivia Tremor Control was led by performers/songwriters/multi-instrumentalists Will Cullen Hart and Expenses Doss, natives of the tiny, isolated city of Ruston, Louisiana, where they struck up friendships with fellow outsiders Robert Schneider (who continued to front side the Apples) and Jeff Mangum (the auteur behind Natural Milk Resort). Throughout senior high school, the aspiring music artists — all affected by famous brands the Beatles, the Seaside Males, the Zombies, Red Floyd, and Sonic Youngsters — exchanged house recordings and performed in each other’s rings. Hart and Doss later on attended Louisiana Technology University collectively, where they tenured as university radio DJs and furthered their musical educations and ambitions. In 1990, Hart, Doss, and Mangum relocated to Athens, Georgia, to create the group Cranberry Existence Routine; when Mangum exited, they enlisted John Fernandes and became Artificial Soaring Machine. After Doss’ short-term defection to Chocolates USA, Synthetic Soaring Machine mutated in to the Olivia Tremor Control at quite similar period both Schneider and Mangum relocated to Denver, Colorado, to start out their own particular tasks. In 1995, the OTC (later on fleshed out by “specialized consultant” Eric Harris) debuted using the EP California Demise, the 1st chapter within an ongoing group of high-concept recordings constructed round the surreal storyline of the imaginary film conceived by Hart and Doss. The follow-up 7″, “The Large Day time,” led straight into the group’s 1996 debut double-LP, Music from your Unrealized Film Script “Dusk at Cubist Castle,” a sprawling assortment of Beatlesque psychedelia, popcraft, and tape loops culled from some 200 unrecorded tunes. (The 1st few thousand copies from the recording also included an added bonus disk of ambient “desire sequences.”) Keyboardist Pete Erchick officially joined up with ahead of 1999’s Dark Foliage: Animation Music with the Olivia Tremor Control, another epic function that consolidated the group’s underground recognition and widened the Elephant 6 cult. Nevertheless, breakup gossips swirled round the group during 2000, and it had been confirmed that this OTC had opted on at least a short-term hiatus toward the finish of the entire year. For the time being, the group’s first recordings — including California Demise and “The Large Day time” — had been reissued on Compact disc as Singles and Beyond. Expenses Doss remained energetic, liberating an EP entitled Future Background of a Sunrise Repair with his fresh project, sunlight Fix. His followers were surprised and saddened by the news headlines of his loss of life on July 31, 2012; Expenses Doss was 44 years of age.