Oliver Future
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Oliver Future

Los Angeles, California, United States

Los Angeles, California, United States
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"Pax Futura Review at Allmusicguide"

Despite the forward-looking title, Pax Futura is an old-fashioned song cycle, and the use of that phrase is a deliberate echo of Van Dyke Parks' 1968 debut album. Pax Futura doesn't sound a bit like Song Cycle, of course (what does?), but like Parks' record, this is an impressionistic suite comprised of songs that look at the city of Los Angeles (the formerly Texas-based band's adopted hometown) seen through the eyes of outsiders. Specifically, outsiders armed with a battery of excellent vintage keyboards, a grab bag of cool production tricks and a fearlessness about bleeding seemingly disparate musical styles together, so that the danceable Stereolab goes Latin-percussion-and-synth groove of "Signing Off" bangs up appealingly against the Edwyn Collins-like white boy soul of "Stranger Than the Stranger," with its mellow verses leading to a tightly wound, jittery chorus, and then both are trumped by the nervy new wave rock of "What Heart?" There's not a duff track here, and the endless invention and subtle detail on display keeps Pax Futura listenable across multiple hearings. This is a band to keep an eye on.

http://www.allmusicguide.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:knfrxze5ldke - Allmusic.com


"#4 selling album on emusic for the week of July 1"

http://www.emusic.com/charts/ch/b/-dbw/b/0-0/557/0.html

Was daily download on emusic.com and featured on countless blogs! - emusic.com


"OLIVER FUTURE, ''SAN FRANCISCO SONG''"


OLIVER FUTURE, ''SAN FRANCISCO SONG''

Like a jangling blast from the not-so distant past, this L.A.-based quintet infuse their compelling power ballad with the melodious, folk-rocking hallmarks of mid-'90s Britpop.

- Entertainment Weekly


"Oliver Future"

In its previous life: This modern rock quintet started out in Austin, Texas, as a boa-wearing glam-rock outfit called the Love Supreme, probably fitting in among all the stoic indie hipsters and country/blues loyalists about as well as former Gov. George W. Bush did before he moved to the White House and expedited the apocalypse. However, the band must've done something right: It became one of the local it-bands at last year's Austin City Limits festival (think a midwestern Coachella) and earned best-band kudos in local alt-weekly, the Austin Chronicle.

Starry-eyed Future: Naturally, the group moved to Los Angeles shortly thereafter, where they scored digs in ever-trendy Echo Park and caught the attention of Eels member Koool G Murder, who ended up producing a trio of songs that would highlight its new E.P., The Bear Chronicles, V. 2. The five-song release -- a preview of the act's sonic shift from keyboard dominance to more rock-centric textures and six-string urgency -- has already caught the attention to the city's influential music cognoscenti, such as the bookers at the Viper Room on the Sunset Strip (where the band held a residency last month) and ex-Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones, host of the revered "Jonsey's Jukebox" lunchtime radio program. Now Ben Harper is courting them for possible future recordings, and their music graces television programs such as MTV's The Real World and A&E's Rollergirls.

But will it win over Vegas?: Hard to say. The music's a little complex, a little dramatic, a little glammy and a little playful -- much like Vegas itself. Comparisons to David Bowie, Talking Heads, Radiohead and even Led Zeppelin abound -- not exactly polarizing musical entities to be linked to, right?

MIKE PREVATT

- Las Vegas City Life


"O.F. about to explode!!"

Indie-pop-rockers Oliver Future are poised at that delicate pre-huge phase, when bragging about liking them is at its sweetest. Meet the band at Tues' show, and when their 2027 reunion tour hits Dodgers Stadium, tell tales of your plugged-in-ness to the oblivious teens zipping by on hoverboards. - Thrill List


"Oliver Future on MTV News"

What Future?: Oliver Future, from Los Angeles! Well, they actually hail originally from Austin, Texas — The Austin Chronicle named them "Best Band in Austin," in fact — but they've since relocated to Tinseltown, and their new LP Pax Futura is "a love story of L.A. outcasts united," according to a press release.

Their Two Cents: In addition to revolving around the City of Angels, the album features the politically charged "Drowning Parade," a song about Hurricane Katrina. - MTV.com


"Best Band '07"

"On my short list of the Best New Bands of 2007." - Chris Douridas, KCRW-FM
- KCRW-FM


"Pax Futura Review at Lostatsea.com"

A few months ago an unsolicited compact disc arrived in my mail from an unfamiliar address in Eugene, Oregon (Route Canal Music, anyone?), and after dusting negative for anthrax I decided to check out the contents. The first thing that struck me was the quality of the CD packaging and sleeve design. This wasn't just some DIY job from someone's basement, way too polished for that. Artistic too, the cover a multihued painting of a multitude of eye-less human faces. The next thing that caught my own eyes was the band's name, Oliver Future, and the persuasive album title, Pax Futura. After trying to dig up dirt on the tell-all internet, I found myself woefully short of information on this outfit. Finally, I did what came naturally: I listened to the dang thing, and am thrilled that I did.

I have since learned that the band is originally from Austin, Texas, but has adopted Los Angeles as its new stomping ground. Oliver Future is fronted by the Lit brothers, Noah (vocals/guitar) and Josh (vocals/keyboard), and rounded out with Jesse Ingalls, Sam River and Jordan Richardson on bass, guitar and drums, respectively. Pax Futura is their sophomore album, and was produced by Brooklynite Adam Lasus, who was behind the boards on the breakout record from Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and has worked with Yo La Tengo and Clem Snide; Pax Futura is the debut release of his newly formed Fireproof Recordings label. As I alluded to earlier, this album calls out "slick!" and the production values don't disappoint. Yet aside from all these hopeful indicators, what really makes this album an incredible spin are the vivid art-rock songs within, as colorful as the suggestive cover.

The album is intended as a mini-suite proclamation to the new Angelenos' city. According to Noah Lit, the band "felt like we had written a record stemming from our experiences and frustrations as we made our transition here." This stance is reflected brightly through the sheer diversity of the dozen songs - at turns soulful, gritty, tender, noisy, grating, beautiful - like the sprawling metropolis itself. Appropriately, the record opens with "The Many Things I am Aware Of," which is a lullaby of dreamy observations set to acoustic guitar and toy keyboard. Things change on a dime with the next track, "The Big Sleep," which scratches and claws its way through comically ominous ideas of a "world gone sane," while postulating "half the world is off making plans/ for when the levee is going to break/ the other half's still taking bets on you."

There is nary a poor song on this disc, and several warrant high praise. "Stranger than the Stranger" is the band's homesick confessional about being in a new world, set up as a Motown shaker with jubilant call and response vocals, bellowing lines "don't you know it's hard out here," and "take it easy/ you'll be alright/ thanks for the money." It captures the anxiety and excitement we all feel when we're uprooted, as does "Happiness Machine," another bopping ditty: "Oh how we've traveled far/ we're right back at the start/ So many backroad tears/ a brand new batch of scars."

Nothing sums up the essence of Oliver Future, and perhaps their mixed feelings about L.A., than the back to back dazzlers that close this suite. "Drowning Parade" is a soulful ballad that could be an Antony and the Johnsons outtake, with its smoky-lounge vocals, alto and tenor saxophones, and Wurlitzer piano. The gentle tune gives way to "The Slow Fast," filled with scraping guitar riffs, techno beats, and punk rock screams "It's a-a-a-l-l... o-o-o-n-n." This record is on alright: on point, and on its way to being one the better surprise releases of the year. To hear for yourself, simply do what I did and put Pax Futura on the stereo.

Reviewed by Ari Shapiro
- Lost at Sea.com


Discography

Letters to Ganymede (out in 2010)
Pax Futura (Fireproof Recordings/Transit of Venus - 2007)
- Tracks from PAX Futura (most notably, Drowning Parade) received large amounts of airplay on KCRW. The band has been featured on Morning Becomes Eclectic and New Ground shows.

Other Releases:
Bear Chronicles V.II (2006)
The Bear Chronicles (2005)
Oliver Future s/t (2003)

Photos

Bio

Letters To Ganymede (2010)
Pax Futura (Fireproof Recordings)
Ink Tank PR

Oliver Future’s sophomore album, Pax Futura, is really a love story – one of a Los Angeles via Austin band in crisis in their adopted city, and the newly relocated Brooklyn producer, Adam Lasus (Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Yo La Tengo, Clem Snide) with something to prove in his new hometown.

Epic but not pretentious, political but not self-righteous, the album is a bizarre sound journey with interweaving plots and surprises along the way. Indeed, Pax Futura is a love story of L.A. outcasts united, even if it is comprised of songs about the apocalypse and Hurricane Katrina.

“This was going to be our ‘L.A. record,’” explains frontman Noah Lit, “but by the time we got around to recording it, we had gone from new transplants to L.A. to feeling like we had written a record stemming from our experiences and frustrations as we made our transition here.”

But the result of this angst was their musical breakthrough. After shrugging off all the people who wanted a say in their career, Oliver Future finally got to make their dream record with a kindred soul who immediately understood that he had something special on his hands. Lasus, the producer behind 2005’s breakout success, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s independently released self-titled debut, discovered the band via KCRW DJ Tricia Halloran and once he pressed the record button, never looked back.

“I’ve never had a record where the flow and creativity and energy was so good, constantly,” exclaims Lasus. “It was mind blowing. I’ve never made a record like that. It was perfect.”

Lasus recorded the band live (except for one song) to capture the spark and energy found at their shows. Together, they labored for months on end to create a sonic wall of textures, tones and melodies to give the recording its distinct sound. Almost the entire second half of the album was written in the studio.

True believers in the fading art of the album, the band created Pax Futura to consist of mini-suites, with songs bleeding into each other as part of a larger story. While each song stands on its own, it’s best listened to from start to finish. However, the overall sound was defined, fittingly enough, by a revelation while driving on the 101 Freeway.

“We wanted to combine the dirty neon energy of Hamburg in '62 with the cool laid back confidence of the motor city circa '72.”

The band knew from the start what the second song on their album would be, but it took a resurrected track written years earlier, post-September 11, to provide the sweet and groovy hook to kick everything off. The dreamy “The Many Things I Am Aware Of,” launches the album before the heavy, funky, sexy riff that holds down “The Big Sleep” takes over.

On “Signing Off,” the first recorded vocal collaboration between singer/guitarist Noah and younger brother keyboardist Josh Lit, the two share singing duties as well as their contrasting outlooks on life. While Josh takes a literal and macabre view on the world and politics, chiding people for not paying attention to the news of the day, Noah has a more figurative and personal view on the end of the world – his apocalypse is sitting across from someone he cares about that he doesn’t recognize anymore.

The Motown cool of “Stranger Than the Stranger,” comes next, quickly slowing the pace. With its irresistibly catchy chorus, it is one of those rare songs that the band debuted live and has played at every show since.

“We’ve never had a song like this before where people just instantly got it,” explains Noah. “You could see people wanting to sing along even though they had never heard it before.”

After the Clash-inspired “What Heart,” the album moves into the second chapter (or Side B on vinyl) -- juxtaposed by the tender love ballad “Whispering Wintry Wind” and the hardest, dirtiest rock song on the record, “Horseslayer Technique.”

Written exactly one year after Hurricane Katrina, “Drowning Parade,” the most outright political song on the album, features another Lit brother, Gabriel, on bass clarinet, as well as other top notch horn players.

With Otis Redding and Led Zeppelin listed equally among their musical influences and samurai films and national tragedies among their muses, Oliver Future has created a sound that is distinctly its own. And in that, they have found solace in Los Angeles.

Stay tuned for their 2010 release of "Letters to Ganymede," which is sure to make some noise in the new decade.

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FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
Ink Tank: (213) 484-4488
Juliana Plotkin: juliana@ink-tankpr.com or Tim Plumley: tim@ink-tankpr.com

OLIVER FUTURE: www.oliverfuture.com
INK TANK: www.ink-tankpr.com