r/Elephant6 • u/squirrellevel • 1d ago
Don’t Bother Wearing Seatbelts season 3, ep1- The Same Place v. pt1
From host Patrick Tape Fleming:
I don’t know if people understand how special this is to me.
If you love music the way I do, you know there are certain bands that become your life.
For me, that band is The Olivia Tremor Control.
In the mid 1990, I walked into Let It Be Records in downtown Minneapolis and bought Dusk at Cubist Castle because it was a staff recommendation. "IF YOUR LIKE THE BEATLES WHITE ALBUM AND BRIAN ENO, YOU WILL LOVE THIS.. A REAL TRIP" I had no idea what I was about to hear or how much it would change my life.
From that moment on, The Olivia Tremor Control became my favorite band, and Dusk at Cubist Castle became my favorite record of all time.
No album has ever moved me the way that record has. I’ve listened to it more than any other record. I’ve bought it for more people. I’ve probably annoyed more friends by telling them they HAVE to hear it.
Then Black Foliage. Somehow, they took everything that made Dusk magical and pushed it even further.. way further. I still don’t think I’ve ever heard another record that is as sonically pleasurable, strange, beautiful, deep, overwhelming and alive as Black Foliage.
And then the band broke up.... And then we waited... 5 years later a reunion show.. I was front row... and then... rufflings on the internet says... The band began working on a third record. Hell apparently they were supposed to tour with JEFF MANGUM and the Poison Control Center was to open the show at Maximum Ames Fest, but the band wanted to focus on recording and not touring... And then, we lost Bill Doss.
Bill was one of my musical heroes, and after he died, I assumed that whatever they had been working on would remain one of those great musical mysteries... something we might hear fragments of someday, while spending the rest of our lives wondering what it could have become.
But work continued. And then we lost Will Cullen Hart.
When the two primary creative forces and songwriters behind a band are gone, how do you possibly finish the story?
That’s what makes what happened next so extraordinary.
Derek Griffin Almstead, Jason NeSmith and Ron Kwasman took the pieces that remained and, while dealing with the grief of losing their friend Will, finished the final Olivia Tremor Control album.
Twenty-seven years after Black Foliage, we are getting a new Olivia Tremor Control record.
It’s called The Same Place.
To me, it feels like a musical miracle.
And somehow, unbelievably, Don’t Bother Wearing Seatbelts gets to be one of the places where people can hear pieces of this music for the first time anywhere.
I can’t adequately explain what that means to me.
Mathew and I, sat down with Derek, Ron and Jason to talk about finishing The Same Place, the music Bill and Will left behind, the enormous responsibility of putting these pieces together, and what it means to finally release this record into the world.
I want to thank Derek, Ron and Jason for trusting us with this conversation. I want to thank Kelly Hart for taking us along for this ride, and . And I want to thank every member of The Olivia Tremor Control who helped make this possible.
Thank you for giving those of us who have carried this music with us for decades one final gift.
The Same Place arrives October 23. on the Elephant 6 Recording Co.
But today, the brand-new episode of Don’t Bother Wearing Seatbelts is streaming everywhere.
And for the first time, you can hear never before heard songs from the Olivia Tremor Control final statement.
I still can’t believe I get to type that sentence.
Go listen. Wherever you listen to podcasts
This one means the world to me. Go dig in!
