Ernest Hood

Ernest Hood was a guitarist, zither player, and field recorder based in Portland, Oregon. While he came from a jazz background and had played with big bands in the 1940s, he is best known for his lone solo album, 1975's Neighborhoods, a poignant, nostalgic collage of ebullient synthesizer-based pieces interspersed with field recordings of everyday small-town scenes. Virtually unheard during Hood's lifetime, the album gained a cult following nearly half a century later, and was reissued in 2019. Hood was born in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 1923. Usually credited as Ernie, he played guitar with his brother, Bill Hood, as well as saxophonist and bandleader Charlie Barnet, during the 1940s. However, he contracted polio in the early 1950s, spending a year in an iron lung and bound to a wheelchair and crutches for the rest of his life. No longer able to play guitar, he learned to play the zither instead. He also began using a wire recorder to capture everyday sounds, such as children playing after school or buying candy at the corner store. Hood co-founded Portland-based community radio station KBOO, and he would incorporate these "audio postcards" into his program. He became active as a recording artist during the 1970s, releasing a dreamy instrumental single titled "Ollie" on A&M Records in 1970, and performing on albums by Brazilian jazz singer Flora Purim. In 1975, Hood released the privately pressed LP Neighborhoods, which mixed excerpts from his library of field recordings with synthesizer melodies and gentle zithers. Few heard the LP at the time, and Hood never made another one; he passed away in 1991. Neighborhoods took on a life of its own during the early 21st century, particularly with the rise of music blogs, YouTube, and other venues for the rediscovery of obscure music. Pitchfork included the release on its 2016 list of the Top 50 Best Ambient Albums of All Time. In 2019, the album was finally reissued by Freedom to Spend, a sublabel of RVNG Intl. run by Pete Swanson and Jed Bindeman, with a portion of the proceeds going to KBOO. ~ Paul Simpson