Drummer Tash Keary and saxophonist Joseph Henwood bolster their niche in the canon of two-piece bands on this dynamic, sundry extended debut.

This is an invitation to those in fervent want of a feast; please take a seat at O.’s dinner table, remove your jackets (it’s going to get sweaty), and secure your bibs. With a fridge containing but an onion and a slab of cheese, it would be easy to underestimate what multifarious flavour combinations the London two-piece could possibly concoct with their elementally undiluted sax-drum formulation. But alas, the resulting spread that O. whip up live in the studio with producer Dan Carey on their debut EP ‘Slice’ is no less texturally rich than an eclectic four-course tasting menu. Emerging from a shared isolation to rouse thrill-hungry, pandemic-smitten South London audiences with their increasingly heady live sets, ‘Slice’ offers insight into a curated selection of stylistically unique creations born from the duo’s patent respect for the improvisational process. This is their meatiest cut to date too, their discography to date consisting only of the single ‘OGO,’ released as part of the Speedy Wunderground 7” series last year.

Rollicking out of the gates with title track ‘Slice’, nimble rhythms suffuse with octave hurdling sax motifs, informed and inspired by the vibrancy and buzz of Brazil’s Carnival. The track grunts back and forth in stuttering muscular gyrations, its eventual ceasing beat exposing a burgeoning melodic hysteria. A flurry of snare-clap taunts incite a riotous crescendo, catapulting the beat back in with heightened intensity.

Mist draws in on the subsequent ‘Moon’, furtive hi-hat taps seducing the sax’s canine howls from a thick smog. The track’s repeating melodic elements have an almost occultic feel, like nonverbal incantations puppeteering an eerie dance of the night’s spectral beasts. ‘Moon’ is certainly the dubbiest offering on the EP, making full use of Carey’s coveted vintage dub production units. Stating that their music “would not exist without King Tubby”, while not identifying as a dub group, O.’s clear fondness for bass driven composition and experimentation with an array of pedals often steers their sound in this direction.

The aptly named ‘Grouchy’ flounces around iteratively, the guttural, pronounced harmonics of Henwood’s saxophone shrieking with a raspy, choral petulance. Once again, with imaginative use of effects here, the sound of the saxophone is transformed, mimicking the synchronous textural density of several stringed instruments in one fell swoop. Use of delay pedals on the drums reintroduces dub flavours before a final, punch-packing refrain. This grumpiness evolves into a full-blooded ferocious anarchism on closing and longest track on the EP, ‘ATM’. With any semblance of order held together by a gossamer thread, a sprinting four to the floor kick drum grapples with a thrillingly cacophonous improvised sax monologue, interposed with riotous, mosh-stirring choruses on this sprawling 6-minute epic. ‘Slice’ is yet another example of Carey’s formidable ability to provoke and capture the rawest snapshots of musical expression in the studio, showcasing O.’s dynamic potency and creative flair. With a constantly evolving and adapting sound, it will be exciting to see where this journey takes them next.