Lost In The Trees

Ari Picker, a Chapel Hill native who began his musical path in the B-Sides, conceived Lost in the Trees as a singer and guitarist. His Berklee College of Music training sparked an orchestral undertaking, for which he selected the Lost in the Trees name. Gathering a modest ensemble of players, he tracked the folk-tinged EP Time Taunts Me for release on Trekky Records in early 2007. Academic obligations blocked touring behind that EP, so Picker set the project aside until 2008, the year he finished at Berklee and returned to North Carolina.

There he formed a new lineup by drawing on Trekky Records associates and members of the University of North Carolina orchestra program. The ensemble produced All Alone in an Empty House, a richly textured sophomore album built around strings, horns, and full orchestration. The record appeared in 2008 and was reissued two years later after the group signed with Anti- Records. The band's sophomore outing, the evocative A Church That Fits Our Needs, arrived in 2012 as a musical tribute to Picker's mother, who took her own life in 2009. Early 2014 brought the third long-player, Past Life.