OVVN returns with “Sores”, the first video from their upcoming debut LP entitled I Love Myself and Want to Live. Starring Mark Nystrom and Sergio Ramirez, it was shot by Timmy Lodhi at the Ruby Room in OVVN’s home base of Oakland, CA. The dark, moody video is a perfect visual manifestation of the band’s heavily fuzzy sound that is as shrewdly evocative as it is brilliantly confounding. Such obfuscation can be considered a trademark for a band known for distorted vocals processed through a guitar pedal. According to OVVN founder and bandleader Ethan Jayne, the striking vocal sound was chosen to alienate a natural form of communication and make it foreign.
This is something his band’s new video also accomplishes well as it alternates between straight-forward performance footage of the band and eerie visuals of a man tied to a chair at the mercy of his captors. As the video plays out, it is unclear if the man is a victim of torture or perhaps instead a willing participant in some fetishized fantasy as he seeks pleasure in his pain. It is in such dissonance that OVVN trades. With self-described vocals that “holler anxiety and portend misery” over “devolutionary lockstep” and “dark psychedelic grime,” the band seeks a terrible sonic beauty in the horror of detuned discord. With “Sores”, OVVN continues this quest with a visceral intensity all their own.
**featured photo by Timmy Lodhi
“Sores” is the leadoff video from OVVN’s upcoming debut LP I Love Myself and Want to Live that is now available for pre-order as a digital download, limited-edition cassette, and 12” vinyl on Don’t Look Down Records.
