was one of the most visible and innovative members of the Elephant 6 collective, a coterie of like-minded, lo-fi indie groups -- including
-- who shared musicians, ideas, and sensibilities.
, natives of the small, isolated town of Ruston, Louisiana, where they struck up friendships with fellow outsiders
Throughout high school, the aspiring musicians -- all influenced by the likes of
the Beatles,
the Beach Boys,
the Zombies,
Pink Floyd, and
Sonic Youth -- exchanged home recordings and played in each other's bands.
Hart and
Doss later attended Louisiana Tech University together, where they tenured as college radio DJs and furthered their musical educations and ambitions. In 1990,
Hart,
Doss, and
Mangum moved to Athens, Georgia, to form the group Cranberry Life Cycle; when
Mangum exited, they enlisted
John Fernandes and became Synthetic Flying Machine. After
Doss' temporary defection to
Chocolate USA, Synthetic Flying Machine mutated into
the Olivia Tremor Control at much the same time both
Schneider and
Mangum relocated to Denver, Colorado, to start their own respective projects.
In 1995,
the OTC (later fleshed out by "technical advisor"
Eric Harris) debuted with the EP California Demise, the first chapter in an ongoing series of high-concept recordings built around the surreal plot of an imaginary film conceived by
Hart and
Doss. The follow-up 7", "The Giant Day," led directly into the group's 1996 debut double-LP, Music from the Unrealized Film Script "Dusk at Cubist Castle," a sprawling collection of
Beatlesque psychedelia, popcraft, and tape loops culled from some 200 unrecorded songs. (The first few thousand copies of the album also included a bonus disc of ambient "dream sequences.") Keyboardist
Pete Erchick officially joined prior to 1999's Black Foliage: Animation Music by the Olivia Tremor Control, another epic work that consolidated the group's underground popularity and widened the Elephant 6 cult.
However, breakup rumors swirled around the group during 2000, and it was confirmed that
the OTC had gone on at least a temporary hiatus toward the end of the year. In the meantime, the group's earliest recordings -- including California Demise and "The Giant Day" -- were reissued on CD as
Singles and Beyond.
Bill Doss remained active, releasing an EP titled
Future History of a Sunrise Fix with his new project,
the Sunshine Fix. His fans were shocked and saddened by the news of his death on July 31, 2012;
Bill Doss was 44 years old.
–
Jason Ankeny, Rovi