In a modern musical landscape saturated with clinical digital perfection and sterile VST presets, there is something wonderfully rebellious about a return to the tactile warmth of vintage circuitry.

Enter OH! Comprising of Italian producers Massimo Paramour and Gianluca Pighi, their 16-track debut ‘We Come In Peace’ was made with a strict philosophy of “no VSTs, no software samples”.

Despite their different geographical bases and distinct musical backgrounds taking in everything from goth and industrial to soulful house and jazz funk, Paramour and Pighi found a unified creative voice during the shared isolation of the pandemic and delivered a double opus that is very different, balancing the intensity of post-punk and the melodies of synthpop with disco, kosmische and retrowave sensibilities in between. There is no doubt that the duo have pushed beyond their comfort zone.

‘We Come In Peace’ serves as a tribute to the music trailblazers of the past with an international cast of guests including Italo disco legend Fred Ventura and Greek songstress Sarah P.  Among the double album’s highlights are the sultry Eurodisco of ‘Love Decayed’ featuring LOCAL SUICIDE, the sunny new wave of ‘Crush’ featuring iDA fLO and the electroclash flavoured ‘Un Livre’ with Astou.

Massimo Paramour and Gianluca Pighi spoke to ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK for an insight into the hardware-driven world of OH!

How did the idea for OH! come into being?

Gianluca: It’s something almost transcendental that doesn’t need a fixed meaning. We liked the idea of having an identity without being completely tied to one specific definition.

Massimo: It also became the title of the opening track on the album. The title itself actually came from one of our featured artists Alexander Price.

‘We Come In Peace’ is a very varied record and perhaps not what might be expected of you both, so how would you describe the concept if there is one?

Gianluca: During the lockdown period we finally had the time to organize a lot of scattered ideas and sketches we had accumulated over the years. From there, we tried to shape everything naturally by drawing from our respective musical backgrounds, without necessarily aiming for a club-oriented direction.

Massimo: I was in a new wave / goth band when I was a teenager, and later involved in another project that fused elements of dark wave and industrial music. My background has always been rooted in post-punk. I started making dance music later in life, so in many ways ‘We Come In Peace’ felt like a return to my musical roots.

When creating the more uptempo songs, did you have to fight against any of your clubbier production instincts at all?

Gianluca: No, it actually felt very natural because we were focused on the songs themselves rather than thinking about where they would belong or be played.

Massimo: I work with different artists every day as an arranger, and every project involves a different genre, so I’m used to sudden shifts in style. Once I get into the mindset of a certain genre, everything flows quite naturally. I just try to give my best within that particular sound.

How did Greek songstress Sarah P. come to be involved?

Gianluca: After hearing some early embryonic OH! ideas, Tareq suggested putting us in contact with her. We sent Sarah a few demos and explained the project, and she immediately connected with it.

Massimo: I instantly fell in love with her soft, whispered vocal tone. It reminded me of so many things I’ve always loved, from the early records of Ilona Staller to Japanese artists Kahimi Karie and Takako Minekawa, whose work I’m a huge fan of.

‘June 14th’ which features Sarah P. appears to capture the atmospheres of ‘I’m In Love With A German Film Star’?

Gianluca: Yes, both Massimo and I have a real soft spot for that song.

Massimo: Absolutely — the whole album ‘Thirty Thousand Feet Over China’ by THE PASSIONS is a masterpiece. It definitely was a big inspiration!

Tareq is another Greek vocalist who appears on the album for ‘Inside A Dream’ which is quite a moody dance number?

Gianluca: It originally started as an instrumental track, just a simple demo made with a drum machine and a sequencer. Later, Massimo added those slightly hallucinatory, dreamlike lyrics.

Massimo: I was revisiting ‘1997: Escape from New York’ by John Carpenter — probably my favourite soundtrack ever and the first record I ever bought — and the bass sequencer was inspired by that world.

Where did you find the other guest vocalists and how did you match them to the songs?

Gianluca and Massimo: They’re all artists and friends we’ve met over the years and stayed in touch with. Once we had a group of demos together, we started thinking about who might be interested in each track and who could naturally fit the different moods.

‘Un Livre’ featuring Astou has this infectious Eurodisco feel, were there any particular tracks that acted as inspiration?

Gianluca: No, it started from a simple melody that eventually became the first finished track of the album, and it actually set the tone and inspiration for the rest of the record.

Massimo: There was actually more than one melody. We were supposed to choose one, but in the end we decided to keep them all and build the track around that idea.

‘Starred’ featuring Dee Sada is a much starker electronic track, were there any particular synths or treatments that you used to create it?

Gianluca: It’s a combination of sequencers created with the MFB Dominion 1, along with MFB drum machines processed with phaser and flanger effects to give it a more unstable, shifting texture.

Massimo: The track is very simple but I really loved how Dee wrote two independent lyrical lines and then layered them together, creating a kind of intentional disorientation.

The ‘We Come In Peace’ title song is very German, very Motorik?

Gianluca: Yes, definitely — and I’m really glad you picked up on that.

‘Oh! (In The City)’ featuring Alexander Price has much more of a post-punk drive?

Gianluca: Yes, absolutely — Massimo really loves that kind of feeling.

Massimo: Ha ha, yes — I’m definitely a hardcore DEVO fan and always drawn to that kind of post-punk energy.

Both ‘Falling’ and ‘Don’t Give Up’ with Lavonz have this Trans-Atlantic new wave feel that could be considered “retrowave”, do you think it is interesting how this sound has lasted over the decades?

Massimo: Yes, definitely. That Transatlantic retrowave / synthwave sound hasn’t just survived — it’s evolved and really thrived. It sits somewhere between classic 80s European synthpop and North American rock, and Lavonz’s voice was key in bringing that balance together.

Gianluca: I think it’s partly because when you write songs with a simple, functional structure, they tend to last over time — they stay open and adaptable, regardless of the era.

Do you have a favourite song from the album?

Gianluca: ‘We Come In Peace’.

Massimo: I don’t really have a single favourite, but ‘We Used to Dance’ probably gets under my skin more than the others.

What is next for OH! or you both in your other guises?

Gianluca and Massimo: There’s definitely more bubbling away for OH! but we’ll reveal it in due course…

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its sincerest thanks to OH!

Additional thanks to Dina Paschalidou Brudi at Eclectica

‘We Come In Peace’ is released as a double vinyl LP by Huldigung, available via https://linktr.ee/we_are_oh_official

https://www.instagram.com/we_are_oh_official/

Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
25th July 2026