As global temperatures continued to rise and we found ourselves finally able to enjoy a summer that was not totalled by pandemics, natural disasters and the like, the uptake in ‘triphop’ among my friends came thick and fast. Slower tempos were the go during those languid, lazy days. And ‘triphop’ had a certain versatility without compromising on suitability. Whether it was having a barefoot mix in front of a blasting desk fan or cruising on an evening drive, we found solace from the heat in ‘triphop’.

Triphop. It’s an umbrella term used to lump together the likes of Bristol legends including Portishead, Smith & Mighty, Massive Attack and their solo offshoot, Tricky. And yet the name has been condemned by these very figures as a form of cultural misappropriation, a (evidently, highly successful) move by British media companies to taxonomically gentrify hip hop. As Wragg notes, triphop’s positioning as a less antisocial alternative to hip hop increased its appeal to the rave scene’s hegemonic white middle class listenership. Triphop did not deal with class or poverty. Triphop was easy-going. Triphop could be purchased from a record store near you. Now whether the solution is to divide and recategorize the genre into ‘Bristol sound’ or ‘instrumental hip hop’, among other labels, is a big question. Considering the ham-fisted systematisation of ‘hyperpop’, Caroline Polachek disavowed the entire genreing enterprise. But I’ll put this on ice—and refrain from describing the following release as ‘triphop’—for the time being (watch this space) …

Redshift’s friends in the Northern Hemisphere (read: seemingly half of Australia) were shedding their winter threads in preparation for summer when they received a gift from the heavens: a.s.o.. a.s.o. is a joint venture between scene veteran Lewie Day (alias: Tornado Wallace) and singer/songwriter/selecta/actor/model/overachiever Alia Seror-O’Neill (alias: Alias Error [sic]). Both Naarm-turned-Berlin creatives, the pair met in Day’s studio, bonding over their musical influences and writing their first song shortly thereafter.

One does not have to listen far to get an idea of Day and O’Neill’s chemistry. O’Neill’s droll tones paint the downtempo canvas in the opening ‘Go On’, with a procession of slinky sax lines, bleeps and guitar plucks floating overhead. You sit back, close your eyes, and feel yourself melting into your chair. But don’t get too comfortable. The following track, ‘My Baby’s Got It Out For Me’, switches gear to a prowling breakbeat and bassline reminiscent of Massive Attack’s ‘Safe from Harm’. This track deploys many of the album’s characteristic features: O’Neill’s ethereal vocals; shoegaze chords; and the ebbing and flowing bleeps that make the record feel especially spatial.

Do these characteristic features ever begin to feel like crutches? Not at all. Subtle variations elevate these features above mere Command-D(uplicate). In just under 42 minutes, the duo captures an impressive amount of emotional depth. Tracks like ‘Rain Down’ and ‘Falling Under’ have a shimmering quality, pressed forward by the drum beat that seems to nip at O’Neill’s ankles. The use of the delay and low-pass filter give ‘Falling Under’ a submerged effect, where the listener is left gasping for air as they break the surface at 1:15. Wow. Run that one back. Then there are ambient tracks like ‘LITD pt. 1’, a warm bath where O’Neill luxuriates in her upper range. Next comes ‘Love in the Darkness’, a ballad for the modern clubgoer and one of my personal favourites. It's the perfect ode to those intimate moments shared in smoky chill-out rooms of nights gone by, and the incredible lightness of pouring ourselves into a moment that we know will not, cannot, last forever (‘Nothing, nothing to lose/Nothing, nothing to keep/We’re dancing to the same song on repeat/We’re dancing to the same song on repeat’). Day gets his turn to indulge a bit, closing the song with an irresistibly smooth synth outro.

Meanwhile, ‘Cold Feeling’ evokes exactly that. It’s a brooding cut that sees an infinitely gentle pitter-patter trying to keep its head above waves of cinematic, sweeping chords. ‘True’ and ‘Thinking’ are similarly Lynchian in their disassembling of our beliefs about what constitutes radio-friendly downtempo music. And finally, there is ‘Somebody’, whose controlled crescendo rises to a shaking, near-sentient state. The execution of this in three minutes is the album’s final and lasting reminder of the duo’s supreme control.

Some fans view the record as the torchbearer of a so-called ‘triphop revival’, a term which we may wish to think twice about enthusiastically using. In any case, the album does have a certain nostalgia. Just as Massive Attack’s ‘Blue Lines’ ascended from the shoulders of previous giants (Herbie Hancock, Pink Floyd, Chef from South Park), a.s.o.’s self-titled debut draws inspiration from earlier icons (Cocteau Twins, Fleetwood Mac, Portishead) to craft a sound that Day and O’Neill may call their own. So, with summer around the corner and a brand-spanking new, dancefloor-deployable remix album featuring Maara and Cousin, let us surrender to a.s.o.’s trailrunnergaze.

90

Joe Negrine

11 November 2023