Amos Childs and Sam Barrett are best known to many listeners for their involvement in Bristol’s Young Echo collective, the former as one-half of Jabu, and the latter for his productions as Neek and as one-half of Gorgonn Sound alongside Kahn. While Young Echo is associated with grime, garage and broken-beat sounds though, the duo’s explorations as O$VMV$M couldn’t be any different, instead focusing on building hazy, loop-heavy ambience.
The third self-titled release in as many years from the duo under their O$VMV$M alias sees them bringing their album trilogy to a close. As with the two preceding volumes, this latest chapter comes across more as a mini-album, with the twelve tracks collected here passing back in just 23 minutes of running time. Many of the tracks here feel like brief downbeat segues or mood pieces than anything else, the longest offerings here barely breaking the two minute mark.
Despite the comparatively small canvases being filled by the duo, it’s remarkable just how much palpable atmosphere and emotion that they’re able to distill into them. Opener ‘Dill’ slowly chimes into focus as glittering bell-like melodies slowly unfurl against muted bass chords, the sense of opulent soul atmosphere generated by the glimmering warm textures calling to mind one of Flying Lotus’ dreamy instrumental interludes.
‘Housephone’ meanwhile sees a looped sample of a rotary phone dialling forming the track’s slow rhythmic heart while metallic chiming chords meandering against ambient background tones, the delicate melodic elements counteracting the slight undercurrent of dread that lurks at the track’s very edges. Elsewhere, ‘Shook’ sends watery sounding percussion rumbling beneath icy synthesised vocal trails and ranging bells, the clattering beats adding a ramshackle edge to the cold glassy electronics and relentlessly looping elements.
‘Return’ ventures further out into ominous gothy atmospheres as a moody bassline flickers against eerie reversed vocal loops, the addition of sampled yells and phased whip-crack snares resulting in what’s easily one of this album’s more menacing moments. O$VMV$M describe their tracks as being ‘mood capsules’, and it’s a perfect description for the haunted and hazy atmospheres being crafted by the duo on these sonic vignettes.
