The First "Goodnight" Of A Rotting Empire

Scenery Blurring

The title track of the new album serves as both an introduction and a summary of the songs to follow.  It is me recognizing that I’m from too many places yet cannot truly call any of them “home,” and that, even when I revisit them after all these years of being away, they do not resemble the images in my fuzzy memory.  However, it does not change the fact that all of their pieces make up who I am, and that I am grateful for being able to call three cultures my own.

Musically, one main melody runs through the entire song, first as a guitar harmony and then as vocals, eventually turning into Rhodes chords and finally as distorted vocal “oooo”s.  It emphasizes (along with the repeating lyrics) the theme of echoes in the song.

A Memories Chase

This is my favorite song from the album.  I think the lyrics are pretty self-explanatory.  I tried to be as fair as possible in posing the question at the end.

You Chose to Bury Love

The human ability to persevere never ceases to astound me.  This song recognizes what people like my grandparents went through in order to ensure a better future for their children.  Life took away their homes, families, belongings, everything, and placed them in unfamiliar territory to start over.  They never lowered their heads.

Northern Strength

I am the sum of my parts, and that means for every one that tries to impose on me its ethnocentrisms, I have two to counter it.

No One Single Part

An instrumental we couldn’t finish back when we did the EP, which makes this song over five years old.  We recorded the er-hu way before realizing how it fits with the theme of the album, and when Mike (drummer) mentioned how the drums sound like chain gang working on the railroad, it all made sense.

Voluntary migration often involves the hopes of a better life: the Chinese who built the American Intercontinental Railroad were just one example.

Tracks in America

I began to suffer from anxiety / panic attacks on a regular basis under the pressures of doing international business.  The fact that I had no idea whether I was doing the right thing or becoming a completely despicable person didn’t help.

Till I Won't Surface

I guess moving around all my life has made me kinda addicted to absorbing new cultures, as if I could somehow become a part of them (and vice versa).  I’ve traveled like mad this past year and-a-half, and along with the temptations of the business world, I could feel myself letting it all change the foundations of who I am.  This is a wake-up call to myself.

Out of the Cave

Partly based on my own experiences working as an illegal migrant worker in the mountains of British Columbia.  There are immigrants who do not want to be where they are, did not get there voluntarily, and will not be rewarded a brighter future by staying.  It hurts even more when your new home is darker than your own.

Broken Faceless Silhouettes

I don’t write love songs, but this one also serves as a good conclusion to the album.  I can continue to look for a place where I “belong” till the day I die, but the truth is it will never be a country or a culture.

Whole

Sometimes the most amazing albums are inspired by equally amazing source material. Such is the case with A Memories Chase, the first full-length by the Chicago-via-Miami band, Ohvaur.

In fact, the band’s main driving force, Timothy Den, has amassed plenty of experience to inspire a 10-disc box set of music. Over the past two decades, Tim has been the Assistant Editor of Lollipop magazine; founded his own website, Transform Online; fronted the Boston-based Kimone, a spacious and driving rock band whose work was produced by former Jawbox head J. Robbins and logged time onstage opening for the likes of Spoon and The Album Leaf; and scored numerous short films, including Bitch, which premiered at the 2007 edition of the Sundance Film Festival.

Through all that, Tim was constantly dogged by an unsettling truth: he was living here in the U.S. illegally.

Tim was born in Taiwan, but at the age of 10, legally moved to Miami with his mother and sister, where they lived for seven years (with a good chunk of that time also spent in Ecuador) before a legal mess ensued, forcing them to return to Taiwan. They managed to make their way to Canada, and then back into the U.S., but were forced to live in fear and anonymity for nearly 20 years.

Now a legal citizen, Tim is finally ready to open up about this harrowing period of his life, starting with A Memories Chase.

Mind you, the album isn’t about the details of these experiences (the full story is in a personal letter written by Tim – available in <a href="http://db.tt/fSvoT1LN" target="_blank">English</a>, <a href="http://db.tt/pY5ttTZq" target="_blank">Spanish</a>, and <a href="http://db.tt/lzmZe9Xz" target="_blank">Chinese</a> – accompanying this bio). Rather, A Memories Chase uses the backdrop of the immigrant experience, and the sounds that Tim has absorbed from his time in Asia, South America, and the States to examine what identity, ethnicity, and "home" means. Too, it is filtered through the hearts and hands of his band, almost all of whom are Latino immigrants or the children of Latino immigrants.

A Memories Chase might use the 60+ years of Tim's family history as a starting point, but its themes are much more universal: how we define ourselves through the people, places, and cultures that bring us into this world and shape our being. Or, as he sings on the album, "No one single part / tells me who I am or not."

How this translates musically is through a lush and haunting web of electronic beats and synth washes, augmented by distorted guitars and visceral-yet-understated drumming. Some songs, like "You Chose to Bury Love," stick closer to the pop formula, while others, like the gorgeous album closer "Whole," are fully processed with vocals and instruments melding together beautifully. A Memories Chase fulfills the promise of so many bands influenced by the world of '90s shoegaze and '00s IDM, connecting the threads via pure songwriting smarts.

According to Tim, "This is the story I've been waiting to tell since I started making music over 20 years ago." The wait is over, and from the sounds of A Memories Chase, his patience has paid off in the form of a musically rich and poignant album that speaks to the heart of anyone, no matter their background and what part of the world they call home.

– Robert Ham

Ohvaur

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