V

It took their fifth studio album for the San Francisco duo of Jon Porras and Evan Caminiti (a.k.a. Barn Owl) to garnish their guitar-fueled experimental doom-drone with some noticeable electronic production. V starts with “Void Redux,” a deeply atmospheric arrangement built on a sprawling and desolate soundscape of minimal bass-drum throbs. Blankets of ethereal guitar distortion are slowly stretched across this sublime sonic realm, along with haunting background ambience that takes its cues from Bruce Langhorne’s arresting score for the 1973 film Idaho Transfer. Things get noticeably darker in “The Long Shadow,” a perfect name for a song that gradually builds on overlapping textures of icy synths and a slow-burning hum that starts as a murmur before languidly transforming into giant walls of crumbling feedback. “Against the Night” starts with eerie sounds similar to ambient black metal before a menacing trill succumbs to the peripheral undulations of swelling bass notes. “Blood Echo” is less sound design and more compositional, as Barn Owl’s quiver of ephemeral noises are accompanied by lumbering dub rhythms mixed almost inaudibly low.