Michael Benjamin Lerner (born September 1, 1986) grew up in
Kenmore, Washington, a suburb of Seattle. He left home at 18 to attend Sir Paul McCartney's
Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, where he studied audio recording. He is the son of the Seattle Radio presenter, Mike West (real name: Vince Lerner), now heard on Sunday mornings at Seattle's 102.5 KZOK-FM as host of
Breakfast with the Beatles. Telekinesis was signed to
Merge Records in early 2009, and shortly afterward released the debut album
Telekinesis! on April 7, 2009. Recorded in September 2008, the album was produced, mixed, and engineered with the help of
Chris Walla (guitarist for
Death Cab For Cutie), who also played on most tracks. Lerner and Walla recorded one song per day on analog tape. Lerner cites the 1983 album
Dazzle Ships, by English electronic band
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD), as a major influence on his work. Telekinesis covered
ELO's "
Can't Get It Out of My Head" for the
American Laundromat Records charity album
Sing Me To Sleep–Indie Lullabies, released May 2010. The outfit also covered
Nirvana's "
On A Plain" in 2011 for
Spin magazine's exclusive tribute album,
Newermind: A Tribute to Nirvana. "Power Lines" from third album
Dormarion (2013), was the title song for the Amazon show
Betas (2013). It was also featured in the 2025 film
Novocaine. == Personnel ==