Free Mind: Overmono steps down in Australia

Tom and Ed Russell of Overmono have a unique take on the ever-evolving, bass-heavy, sound-system-ready music coming out of the UK today. The British duo have truly created something special. So much so that it’s hard to capture in words their eclectic processes, visceral harmonies, and formal variety, which takes most of its inspiration from sweaty club nights.

As Overmono gear up to play their new live set at Pitch Music and Arts Festival, they are also getting ready to release their new album Good Lies. In it, the duo propels past the expectations of electronic music. Pairing mangled vocals with beautiful chords and the hardest hitting UK drums, it’s almost as if they’ve created their own genre. I can safely say that the album blows past any fan’s expectations.

In the early hours of the morning, I had the pleasure to chat with the brothers and hear how they have been able to create and expand the world of Overmono.

RF: How have you guys been? It’s an exciting time for you!

ER: We’ve been good! Pretty busy. Going for a rehearsal today and then flying down.

RF: And how has 2023 been for you guys so far?

ER: So far, we’ve been spending a lot of time working on the live show. After touring up until the end of last year, we’ve been figuring out how we’re going to perform all the new material from the latest album. Australia is going to be the first test run for our new stuff. It’s been shitloads of work but so cool to do. After touring the last show for so long it feels nice to prepare new material.

RF: In a video I saw a few years back, I remember you guys mentioned that one of the most time-consuming parts of rehearsing is problem solving. Do you still find this takes up a lot of your time?

TR: We have become better at solving problems. When we try to incorporate new material though, as we are now, we still get presented with new problems. We are always trying to learn more and push the set further.

ER: We used to rewrite the whole show after almost every set. We would change all our equipment and even the music sometimes. It was a long period of trial and error. Only until about 2 years ago, did the set finally start to form into what it is now. It’s nice that after a few years of fucking about and experimenting, we were able to figure it out.

RF: Almost as though you needed to find your formula?

ER: Yeah, just figuring out what works in a live situation and what doesn’t. We used to take loads of modular gear and eventually we found it impractical. There’s still a case of problem solving but it’s a lot more focused now.

RF: Compared to the early more improvised days, is your rehearsal time more structured?

ER: I think the biggest thing we think about is how the set is structured. The technical side of the show is less of an issue for us. We have that locked down. Now we spend most of the time thinking about how we want to present and form the music. That also means working out what we each want to do during the sections of the set.

TR: For instance, both our sides are locked down to the point where we’re so confident in the kit we want to use. Now we’re able to move the set and just plug in without the hassle of so many wires. That frees up our thinking and allows us to form a more precise sound.

ER: That’s a good point there! Playing live, we only have so much headspace. We want to have freedom to do the fun stuff! That’s when we figure out how to make it most enjoyable. When we let go of all the boring logistical stuff, it forces us to figure out what we can do within the parameters of the performance. It also allows us to be more creative.

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RF: It seems that in the past few years of the Overmono project, aesthetics and visuals have become more coherent. What do you think enforced this decision and how have you been able to create a sense of identity through the visuals?

ER: I think it’s always something we wanted to do. We always had the idea of accompanying the set with a strong visual. It’s just one of those things that takes time to figure out and achieve. It took a few years to get to a point where we felt like we had the resources to fulfil the vision.

TR: Like with the Doberman album covers, we teamed up with Rollo Jackson who we’ve wanted to work with for a while. We focused on one record at a time, allowing the visual to expand nicely in the new album.

RF: Seems like you guys are always manifesting and talking about creative decisions. Does this flow through your musical decisions too?

TR: Yeah we’re always talking about music and always making tracks. We’re pretty fucking boring to be around (laughs) because that’s all we want to do.

ER: We’ll get back after a show at 3am and go back to one of our hotel rooms and end up just sitting there with a laptop making tunes until we realize we’re about to be picked up.

RF: Seems like it’s just an endless hole.

TR: Yeah it’s a nice hole to be in!

RF: I’d love to talk about some of the key characteristics of your production. There is a lot of vocal sampling for example. Do you feel like you're able to send specific messages across to your audience through these vocals?

ER: With the vocal samplings, we always try capture the ideas and voices in our heads. I’d love to do cryptic messaging through vocal chops. Maybe that’s a new avenue to start exploring haha!

RF: I feel like vocal sampling and chopping has become such a definitive part of music in the UK.

TR: Yeah, I think garage played a massive part in modernizing the vocal chop. Before that, a lot of hardcore music used samples in a spliced-up way.

RF: I don’t know if you’d want to give too many of your sampling secrets away but can I ask where you are finding these samples to chop?

ER: It’s a mix of everything: a lot of late night Bandcamp scrolling; some stuff is recorded; some Tom has even sung and re-recorded.

RF: Tom, could you tell me more a bit more about your role in the production process?

TR: We don’t really have super defined roles. We always crossover. Ed definitely has a knack for finding vocals and chopping them. He’s got a knack for programming drums too. I might lean more into the synthesizer elements and developing chord progressions. It’s all about throwing ideas into the pot together and seeing what floats to the surface.

ER: One of us has will usually write a beat, then the other person will mangle up that beat maybe weeks or months later. It’s a weird entangled production process.

RF: Like a constant remix or re-edit of each other’s ideas?

TR: Well, we resample each other all the time. We have a folder that we put all our ideas into. For example, I’ll sit down one evening and find something new that Ed has made. I’ll just muck around with that and bounce it back into the folder I found it in. Then Ed will play me something and he’ll say it was the sample I made but I’m just thinking ‘how the fuck did he do that?’ It’s nice how we bounce ideas back and forth without even talking to each other about it. We just grab what’s there and do what we want with it.

RF: Is there a specific piece of equipment that you guys felt inspired to use a lot on the album?

TR: Yeah, the saturation unit Bereich03 Density features across the whole album. That piece of kit has been very influential. It gave the album its sonic stamp. We’re very particular about how things sound. It’s not very easy to put into words but we know when things sound good only when we hear it how we want to. We spend days on a track just to get it to sound how we want it to.

ER: Yeah, and a synth that we used loads was a UDO Super 6. Shout out to those guys because it’s unreal.

RF: Sounds sick! Always love when artists can nerd out about some gear!

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RF: I read that you guys first lived in London to pursue Overmono but then moved out of the city. How does your location effect your approach to making music?

TR: Inspiration really depends on your studio setup. We had a studio together in London for years and now we have our own separate spaces. Now, it’s way more productive because we’re able to write music at the same time, bouncing it back and forth. It also means that we’re not constantly around each other.

ER: The reality is that we wrote most of the new album on the road. We wrote most of the music in the back of a car on the way to the airport. It’s looking like most of that will happen again this year too. That’s been the biggest thing. Moving out of London hasn’t impacted us that much. We write music in so many different places.

RF: To wrap it all up, what can we expect from the new album?

TR: We’ve really pushed ourselves into new territory. We never want to feel still. This album is a milestone of what we’ve done so far as Overmono and where we’re going to go next.

ER: Yeah, and I can’t wait to develop the full new live set with this album incorporated. The fun part of the process is expanding all this new material into a live setting, making new versions. That’s going to be amazing heading into the summer!