[sound bites]

Oliver Twists:
Nathan Oliver brings musical merriment to Soapbox

Andrew Kinback

Nathan White and Mark Lebetkin of the band Nathan Oliver remember their first performance well. What started out as a maiden show with early jitters ended with a pair of gigantic women’s panties thrown at them with an unmentionable undergarment snagging on the mic stand.

The jury is still out on whether this was a signal from God or if there really is a very large woman running around without her underpants on. Still, the message was clear: Wherever Nathan Oliver goes, fun and weirdness prevail.

The musical and artistic world of Nathan Oliver can only be roughly described in a hodgepodge scenario: Imagine Royal Tenenbaum director Wes Anderson, artist Art Spiegelman and a bunch of bohemians got drunk and stole instruments out of the back of the Pixies’ van to hold their own jam sessions while laughing all the way home.

“We sound like a quirky bunch of frantic post-college goofballs, but we wish we were Canadian goofballs,” Nathan says during an interview with encore last week.

A dark, sarcastic but strangely fun and inviting humor surrounds the band and its popish-alternative sound. Even Oliver’s cover art and flyers, done by San Francisco artist Allison Gore, has an absurd and dark comedy about it. Pop-rock lately has taken on the image of either over-dressed sexed jailbait with cookie-cutter lyrics or guys with mascara-stained shirts—from their tears, of course, following the break up of their two-week tryst with some girl. Nathan Oliver is outside the lines of all that, looking in and goofing on it.

“A big part of the reason why I make music is to reach people [who are] put off by faux egos. I want everyone to feel welcome—even Presbyterians,” Nathan says.

“I wouldn’t go that far, Nathan,” Mark says.

“No descendants of Borispol, Ukraine, allowed.”

“I’m quitting the band, but not this interview,” Mark jokes—showing the at-ease banter the two obviously indulge upon daily.

Nathan White is a UNC dentistry student who was the original seed for the Nathan Oliver project. He met Mark in 2004 when they began to flesh out years of Nathan’s bedroom songwriting. “I remember writing the last song on our debut, Sleep Song, in my dorm room,”

Nathan recollects. “I wrote it to a certain dead guy who was in a band called Nirvana. I used to love Nirvana. I recorded a demo of it with my roommate in the room watching TV. He was trying to ignore me.

I was trying to learn how to sing harmony voice-overs on my computer. So all you could hear was me squealing out of key down the dorm hall. I don’t think my presence was appreciated.”

Since then drummer John Tokarczyk has joined the band along with a few other off-and-on members to bring to term the existence of Nathan Oliver’s sonic sentiments. So far the band has appreciated the response from fans and the subtle additions to their underwear collection. Speaking of which, back to the giant panties:

“We are not expecting this from the fine people of Wilmington, but, baby, we’re not going to fight it,” Nathan admits.

“Once I broke my skull in Wilmington—true story,” Mark adds quickly.

Oops, interview over. That story will have to come at another time. Or ask Mark about it first-handedly as the members of the musical collective, Nathan Oliver, want the fine people of Wilmington to consider coming out on June 28th at 9pm to see them play at the Soapbox with The Western Front and Americans in France. Tickets are $5. To check out the work of Allison Gore, go to allisongore.com.