Richmond band Opin (Photo by Samuel Dixon)
Fresh from the breakup of White Laces, a band that introduced an array of original rock recordings, Landis Wine and Tori Hovater have managed, in their debut of the band Opin, to top themselves. Delivering a unique blend of instruments and guest musicians to their compositions, including Ethan Johnstone (Night Idea, Houdan the Mystic) on drums and Jon Hawkins (Navi, Doubtfire) on modular bass synth, Opin has hit the Richmond music scene with an impressive collection of songs in the “blown-out electronic pop” vein, says Wine. “When the project started, I had a lot of arrangements together and wanted to figure out how to build them into something resembling a band,” he says. “I figured it would be fun to build out a virtual band with different friends and musicians I admired.”
Before the split with White Laces — a group that, like Lucy Dacus, is an alumnus of Richmond’s EggHunt Records — Wine began to work on songs that were markedly different. He experimented with riffs built piece by piece from disparate synths, samples, short instrumental loops and bits of “found sound.” Wine discovered that this approach yielded a lyrical freshness.
As song ideas developed, a variety of instruments entered the picture through the contributions of musicians around Richmond, including David Hood of No BS! Brass Band on saxophone; Lindsey Spurrier of garage punks Hot Dolphin on backing vocals; Dash Lewis of Gardener on modular synthesizer; Hannah Standiford of the gamelan ensemble Rumput; and finally, Hovater adding vocals and piano. Hovater, in fact, quickly became a major creative input to Opin. Pieces of recordings were made around the city during the past year, including spaces in old garage-door factories and the basement of the Richmond Ballet, creating a wonderful sense of depth to each track.
Though Wine sings and plays bass, his biggest contributions to Opin’s sound are technical, blending guitar, synthesizers, piano and vocals on tracks such as “Savored Assistance,” “Flee” and “Diamond Edition” — compositions reminiscent of progressive and new wave music of the 1970s and 1980s, but with 21st-century technology and flair.
Wine put much time and thought into the creation of Opin’s self-titled debut. “After a lot of trial and error,” he notes, “I started to build a sonic lexicon and from there it was just a matter of fleshing things out. All of the songs have fully electronic, sequenced backbones, but the piano, horns, drums, gamelan and vocals provide a through line between the album.”
Opin’s album release show will be at Strange Matter, 929 W. Grace St., on March 24. CDs and vinyl will be available for sale. Tickets are $7 at the door.
