On Air
Ear Candy Ear Candy! No theme, No genre. Just tasty tunes.
Home

Remembering Neo-Psych Genius Will Cullen Hart

13 December 2024 Featured Music Reviews


by Shapan Debnath

The sound in the forest, you heard the whisper, I know you’ve come a long way

When I think of why Will Cullen Hart has struck such a chord in me, even beyond the eons of sound he’s jam packed via 4 track recorder, I continuously come back to his lyrics. Across his brilliant contributions to the Olivia Tremor Control and Circulatory System, there was always this constant urgency in the face of what felt like an infinite multiverse, an entirely delightful urgency. His lyrics were caked in the personification and imagery that made other dream pop titans like Sparklehorse and Low household names amongst the indie community, but as much as anything there was this constant sensation of us vs. those who don’t want us to be, well, us. Hart constantly used the royal we in his lyricism, made the listener feel like he/she/they were part of his community, and we need to find a way to get through this kaleidoscopic world together.

And boy did he ever provide the kaleidoscope. The Olivia Tremor Control originated in the late 1980s as one of the most important bands from the Athens, Georgia based Elephant Six Collective. Elephant Six consisted of a group of like-minded friends, exchanging instruments and band members, and provided me with so much music having come of age years after most of the music was released, thousands of miles away in California. The Olivias originally consisted of Hart, Bill Doss, and Jeff Magnum before Mangum left for his project Neutral Milk Hotel. At the core of the Olivias were always Doss and Hart.

Doss came off as the more organized, tight pop song creator of the two, a partner to corral Hart’s divergent writing, akin to an experienced movie director like Spike Jonze reigning in the stream of consciousness of a screenwriter like Charlie Kaufman. When you listen to the Olivias sprawling LPs, Music From the Unrealized Film Script: Dusk at Cubist Castle and Black Foliage: Animation Music Volume One, it is not just the lead vocals that distinguish who quarterbacked each song, but the essence of the songs. Doss, who passed away of an aneurysm in 2012 right as the Olivias were touring and working on a third LP, was an expert storyteller, capturing moments of bliss and excitement in a way that recaptured how carefree Paul McCartney felt writing some of his best tunes for the Beatles. Hart was his own animal entirely, pushing his very clear pop sensibility to the absolute edge with every idea he could think of, and pulling lyrics from any bit of nature that would surround him. Together they formed one of the most potent neo-psych combinations in music, writing songs so accessible but so constantly on tilt that in the blink of an eye you’d get several meanings. You had Doss with his power pop leanings, bright harmonies, observational stories, and clean chords to bounce off of Hart’s breathy vocals, existential pondering, hissing loops, and bursts of instrumental spontaneity.

The thought of a third Olivias album lives rent free in my head with every rumor that came that it was still being worked on even after the tragic passing of Doss. Hart had mentioned an extensive library of Olivias music needing its finishing touches before being released into the world. There was nothing I looked forward to more. I stumbled onto the Olivias early on while a DJ at KUCI, and they are easily one of if not the most influential band I have heard in my life. Whether it was emulating the Elephant Six community with my friends, my sensibility when listening to psychedelic pop music, or just from walking around in nature hearing any random crap that comes in repetition, I owe the band so much. On the same day that Hart passed away, the Olivias released two singles that made it feel like they never left. It was an incredibly bittersweet moment.

Beyond his bands and all their creative members, I found a real kindred spirit with Hart. I met him once after an Elephant 6 Holiday Surprise Show in LA, and while I immediately was so geeked to be able to talk to a legend, I realized quickly Hart was just as excited to learn about my life. We swapped musical references and talked about NYC. He quickly disarmed any sort of nerves I had, and made me just wonder at how incredibly enthusiastic he was about music. He was every bit the person who could have dreamed all those songs. The Olivias blessed us with two near picture-perfect sound collage LPs, but Hart, amid a Multiple Sclerosis diagnosis, kept making music including while and after I was at KUCI, each record a reminder of his musical singularity. His ability to weave a tapestry of sounds with unforgettable hooks, and those lyrics.  I truly do not think I will come across another musician so unique in his mastery of his craft, while in essence taking pride and not limiting himself to any sort of craft at all. His artwork was also a wonderful representation of everything that made his music extraordinary.

So, I write this now for the people that felt like, even in moments without a community, they had one in songs like the ones Hart wrote. The ever present royal we. That we’re made of joy and make belief, live in the worlds we paint, through the stars and molecules we sail past, thinking about things we’ll find once we dust off our maps, how we’re moving ever closer, heading to the same place, living in the parades we create, and imagining an eternity wrapped in silver sound. I write for the community that feels a real sense of loss after the deaths of Doss and now Hart, and scour the internet to find appropriate mourning for these titans of psychedelia, to feel that sense of relation that Hart constantly provided for us. I write for my community in college radio, and for the curious kid that might see this and turn to Rock A to find the Olivias’/Circulatory System’s masterpieces, that foundationally lived in so many playlists I had during my time doing college radio. I listen to Hart’s songs again and I feel a real sadness thinking of him, always considering him as part of the we he coined for his audience. But in his music, he really does live forever, and we know it’s true.


Play
Volume
Discover More
Top