About Ockham's Razor

Ockham's Razor is a five-piece darkwave, synth-pop and ethereal music band from Los Angeles, California. The group came together around one straightforward ambition: to make music that uses the latest electronic technology without ever giving up the warmth of live playing. Guitars, pianos, drums and voices share the same space as synthesizers and sequenced parts, and the result is a sound that is dark in mood but melodic and memorable at its core.

Every Ockham's Razor release has come out through Midnight Magic Records, the independent label behind the band's self-titled debut album, catalogue number MMR200301. That record gathers the songs the band played across Los Angeles — “Time”, “Disturbed”, “I've Been Losing You”, “Chasms” and “Far Away” — alongside a cover of Tears for Fears' “Mad World”. A limited edition mini-disc single of “Disturbed” followed, individually numbered and pressed in a run of only one hundred copies.

This website is the band's own archive. It was launched in 2003 with Sharon Bach as author and webmaster, and it remains the only place where the band's songs, photographs, press material and performance history are collected together. Everything here — the sound clips, the album artwork, the merchandise — is served directly from the site, without advertising, accounts or third-party players.

Ockham's Razor began with two performers in a Hollywood night club. Belinda Bach, a professional singer-songwriter who had been on stage since she was four years old, met Patrick McMahon, a performer with a flair for vocal acrobatics and a long list of classical training and theatrical credits behind him. They found quickly that they wanted the same things from a band: strong songs, a dramatic live show, and a sound that could move between the electronic and the acoustic without ever sounding like a compromise.

The line-up grew from that first meeting. Belinda's brother Jonathan, a percussionist who had been playing drum kit and marching percussion since 1994, moved to Los Angeles and joined the band on drums and backing vocals. Jeremy Wheeler, a gifted keyboardist and synthesizer technician, completed the quartet after a single rehearsal — he could pick up the piano and synthesizer parts by ear within a few moments of listening and then elaborate on them, and as a software and hardware technician he understood the instruments and the electronics behind them.

Sheldon “Lurch” Morley, on guitar and bass, is the most recent addition to the line-up. The original site noted that his full biography was still to come, and the band has kept that note as part of the record.

The band's goal has never changed: a commercially viable sound that still caters to the more discriminating listener. In practice that means marrying the hard-hitting sounds of the latest electronic technologies with the smooth and elegant tones of live acoustic instruments.

“A perfect marriage between the hard-hitting sounds of the latest electronic technologies and the smooth and elegant tones of live acoustic instruments.”

Each member carries part of that balance. Jeremy's pianos and synthesizers supply the atmosphere and the low end, and his technical ear keeps the electronic side of the band working as an instrument rather than a backing track. Belinda's guitar and vocals and Jonathan's drums keep the music physical and human, while Patrick's voice rides above the arrangement. Nothing on a live stage or on record is there by accident: the electronic parts are played with the same intention as the acoustic ones, and the acoustic parts are asked to be as precise as the machines.

The result sits comfortably in the darkwave and synth-pop traditions while borrowing the space and texture of ethereal music. It is danceable when it wants to be, and it is patient enough to let a single mood build across a whole song when that serves the material better.

The band's lyrics have been described as haunting but true to life. Some of the songs are stories, with characters, situations and consequences that play out over a verse and a chorus. Others set out to capture an emotional state of mind and hold it still for the length of the track, letting the arrangement do the arguing. Both kinds of writing come from the same place: ordinary experience looked at closely enough that it becomes strange again.

That approach shapes the recorded work and the live set alike. Songs such as “Time”, “Disturbed” and “Far Away” carry the storytelling side of the band, while pieces like “Chasms” lean harder on atmosphere and feeling. A cover of “Mad World” sits alongside them, chosen because its tone of quiet disillusion fits naturally beside the band's own writing.

Ockham's Razor built a loyal following across Los Angeles and the surrounding areas, playing club nights, festival weekends and awards bills rather than chasing a single scene. The band appeared at The Garage and The Gig in the summer of 2003, played the S.W.R.E weekend in Ontario, California at the end of August, and took the stage at Club Qtopia on Hollywood Boulevard for the Rock City News 20th Anniversary Music Awards, where the band performed at 2:00 AM. A further date at Canter's Kibbutz Room on North Fairfax followed in November 2003.

That year also brought recognition from the local music press. Ockham's Razor was nominated in Category 31 — Best Goth Band at the 2003 Rock City News 20th Anniversary Music Awards, known as “The Rockies”, alongside the wider Los Angeles darkwave and goth scene the band had grown up in.

The performance history is documented in full on the performances page, and the nomination itself is recorded on the awards page — both kept here as an archive of what the band did in 2003 rather than a list of events still to come.