acoustic guitars in made up tunings. looper pedals. minidiscs. bicycles. phone cameras. playing with my family.
My Phantom Voice. In the wood and the strings of the guitar.
I feel a need to explain but does it matter?
Everything vibrates with an energy.
That it then gets put in a little digital box for you to (hopefully) look at (first),
(Hopefully) listen to (second) is both my doing
And undoing.
October, gateway to Autumn proper. Turning leaves, now falling.
But yet such chaos all around us. What will we notice in the clamour of it all? Possibly nothing.
Take care.
x
Early September myself and Lee Allatson played out as a duo again. This time we tried a more song orientated approach leaving large spaces to fill out the room space as we found it. Above is one those moments.
I was hesitant to include my nervous spoken ramblings but decided to share any way. It’s not something I often do and it’s easy to be critical after the fact but then and there, when you are trying to think about it, the words just come out so. It was a great evening all round.
Please do check out some of Lee’s other work including the incredible Ka Safar
I have hearing back in my left ear. Everything became suddenly brighter and too loud. Like a waking and/or a remembering. Here are some Walkman recorded and bowed guitars
It’s April. I appear to have lost the bulk of my hearing in my left ear (currently). My house is literally a building site (currently). Elastic bands and contact mics is about the best that I can manage.
March has been long and at times really quite hard. These overlapping strands feel like the absent minded shading-ins where my mind has been ‘elsewhere’ when it should have been ‘there’. I guess this is me looking back at them and thinking ‘what was that?’
The second of my ‘trying to make a thing a month’. I went away to Norfolk for a few days in February and took my recorder and some contact mics (that I’ve never used before) with me to try and record some of the sounds of the reeds and the marshes. I love the sound of the reeds swaying in the wind, that ‘whooooosssshhhhhhh’. I’ve always wanted to walk into the middle of it crouch down and listen – except you can’t really do that as it can be quite dangerous.
Instead I attached mics to wires, flung the Zoom into the reeds and grasses, generally hung 25 metres back from my family as they walk ahead, me just staring at whatever was around me. My recorder’s headphone out doesn’t work so I have no idea what I have recorded until I empty it out on the computer. It’s a little like film photography, it’s always a surprise.
Last weekend myself and the wonderful Lee Allatson played a short improvised set at the Under The Radar weekender put on by Magic Teapot and Echoloaction. It was a really enjoyable set, playing on the floor & feeling our way in the darkened room. Below is a video of the second half of our set, gradually pulling at the threads of the sounds we’d made and reducing them to a new quiet. A massive thank you to whoever filmed this, I am most grateful.
The All In is the last session of the year for the south leicestershire improvisors ensemble, where as many guest performers from previous sessions join in to make one massive ensemble. This was my first time in a while playing in such a large ensemble. The range of instruments and sounds was really quite broad and fascinating to be a part of. There are some pictures here (and some below) taken by Jordan Parker. There is also a bandcamp link to the 2016 All In which you should definitely have a listen to as well.
