The Mountain Movers

Mountain Movers is a popular term in evangelical Christianity, used in the names and slogans of a variety of prayer groups, faith-based private charity organizations, lobbying groups, and the like. (Its derivation is the scriptural quotation "Faith can move mountains," spoken by Jesus in Matthew 17:20.) Mountain Movers is also the name of a dark-hued indie pop outfit from New Haven, CT, led by singer, songwriter, and guitarist Dan Greene. Greene comes by the reference honestly: prior to devoting himself to the cause of ornate, semi-orchestral indie rock, the Worcester, MA, native was a divinity school student. After a crisis of faith led to his leaving divinity school, Greene transferred to the small liberal arts school Hamilton College in upstate New York, where he met singer and guitarist Jeff Greene (no relation) and formed the Butterflies of Love in 1994. Following three albums — 1996's America's Newest Hitmakers, 1999's How to Know the Butterflies of Love, and 2002's The New Patient — and a spate of singles and EPs, Greene found himself with a clutch of 24 songs he'd written since his divinity school days about faith, temptation, and other topics that seemed too personal for a band he wasn't sole leader of. Rather than release them as a solo album, Greene — by now based in New Haven, CT, where he had a day job as a teacher at a private elementary school — asked various friends in other local bands to join him in a new band, including bassist Rick Omonte and drummer Jason Bates of Crooked Fingers, plus keyboardist Rob Katz, reedsman and cellist Erik Elligers, and trumpeter John Panos of Pencilgrass. After the band recorded all two dozen of Greene's songs, half of them were fashioned into a loosely structured concept album called We Walked in Hell and There Is Life After Death, released on the New Haven indie Safety Meeting Records in the fall of 2007. The remaining dozen were planned for a companion disc in 2008. Greene remains a member of the Butterflies of Love, whose fourth album, Famous Problems, was also released in 2007.