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Listen to OSEES’ no-guitars synth-punk album ‘SORCS 80’
Brooklyn Vegan

SORCS 80 hits you upside the head from the first second of opening volley “Look at the Sky,” and you are barely given a chance to get your bearings before being pummeled again. So it goes for the whole shebang that leaves you punchdrunk and giddy. This is OSEES‘ 28th full-length and following last year’s immediate, near-poppy Intercepted Message, he’s devolved the band’s sound, diving into the primordial ooze for an album of bashing caveman punk. Albeit one with NO GUITARS, and only two two synth sounds in their place.

Osees Discuss the Pared-Down Synth-Punk of SORCS 80
Flood

Basically I wrote the demos at home using a synthesizer. I did it on a four-track cassette, which was really fun. Every song was just drum loops, bass, keys, and vocals. One day, me and Tom [Dolas, keyboards] sat down and picked a sound each. I picked a thin, aggressive tone and he picked a more round one with less attack. Then we took those tones and ran them into Pro Tools and into a three-octave keyboard. Then we loaded the songs I’d written into these Roland SPD-SX’s so we could play them like drums, but tonally. The idea initially was that all four of us could be on stage playing them, with Tim Hellman holding down bass guitar. There is bass on the record, but I’m not playing guitar. I originally wanted Tim to play sampler, but we ran out of time for this stupid idea we were running with. But it was interesting to write an entire record using just one sound, but affecting it with guitar amplification.