Sam Mehran

His last work released before his death was his co-writing and co-production of Ssion's O (2018). Prior to his death, he was working on co-writing and production of Katie Rush's second and third albums, and a debut EP with Marion Belle (also known as Fatal Jamz).  The second Katie Rush album Stage Life was released postmortem in April 2019, and his album with Belle was released in August 2019.

On the morning of July 29, 2018, Mehran was found dead by suicide in his Hollywood home. News of his death was broken by collaborator Zak Mering through social media, who also said that Mehran had just completed work on a planned solo album.

OLR issued numerous cassette tapes and limited edition vinyl discs, and according to Mehran, the project lasted until "somewhere in the spring of 2011". Its first LP release was the compilation Singles, Demos and Rarities (2007-2010), released on April 15, 2013, and was intended to be its only album. A follow-up, Birds, Bees, Babys, Bacteria, was issued on cassette later that year. After OLR, Mehran co-wrote and co-produced Katie Rush's Law of Attraction (2014). He then produced Puro Instinct's Autodrama (2016) and Samantha Urbani's Policies of Power (2017).

Mehran, along with Rory Attwell, founded Test Icicles in 2004. The band was active until 2006, when it broke up. Mehran began releasing music under the alias Outer Limits Recordings in 2010, which was immediately associated with the era's loose-knit, early hypnagogic pop and chillwave scene. He described himself being influenced mostly by Ariel Pink, R. Stevie Moore, and "basically most music that was recorded before 1990." Music journalist Paul Lester characterized OLR as "heavenly hooks and catchy choruses". Marc Masters of The Wire compared his Foxy Baby album to Ariel Pink's "AM pop blender", and described the Matrix Metals album Flamingo Breeze as a "mini-masterpiece of sub-disco loops".

Sam Mehran (/ˈ m ər æ n / MUR -a-n August 17, 1985 – July 2018), also known as Sam Meringue, was an American-Australian musician, songwriter, and producer who co-founded the punk band Test Icicles and later formed the solo projects Matrix Metals and Outer Limits Recordings (OLR). His solo work differed substantially from Test Icicles and was often produced in a lo-fi manner. He received little critical notice in his lifetime, a Dazed Digital editor commented, however, "Mehran possessed an incomparable talent that belied his relatively low public profile."