Sounds Like Trouble.

A week of non-stop audio - leaves me somewhat frazzled ..... to recap:

Monday 13th
Watershed, Bristol - facilitated part of a one-day workshop (Up to Speed The Potential of Broadband as a New Space for Research, Development and Production) for an invited audiance consisting of various artists/technology types .... producing small-file-size audio content and mobile-phone films for use with the Visitors Studio platform - hosted by Marc and Ruth over at Furtherfield... go check it out and join the fun...

Tuesday 14th - Friday 17th
Stroud Valleys ArtSpace, Stroud - 4 day stint up in Stroud working with 4 visual artists to produce new audio work - think sounds of rioting, bats flying, sub-harmonic throbbing and vocal-screaming - add a degree of exhaustion from 160 mile round trip daily comute and you may sort of get the picture ...

Friday 17th (8.30pm till far too late ...!)
Resound - Sounds Like Trouble - techy/front-of-house audio abusive behaviour (Adrian Sherwood taught me all I know about this stuff - and my ears will never be the same again)...! This was an stonker of a gig - take 10 or so audio artists - one 30,000 pound suround sound system - seat 50 people inbetween the 10,000 Watt system and bombard them with various at times extreme variations on a theme of sound-art... Highligt by far being the a recording of the destruction of a building by Duncan Whitley - he sums up this work as follows:

"In the recordings of the demolition of Rachel and Rathbone towers in East London, 2004, all sounds within the microphone's range become indicators of acoustic space – the helicopter passing overhead, voices on the wind, the chatter of birds arcing through space. I work with diverse recording techniques to recreate acoustic space, from binaural sound (designed for playback through headphones), to multi-microphone arrangements designed to record an ‘event' from multiple perspectives."

Picture me and Duncan - some 20 foot above the heads of the audiance below - me on live-mix and Duncan firing off sound clips into the system via a laptop PC - Duncan gives some sign language requesting we should crank the volume up somewhat - now the afore-mentioned surround-rig has only 2 controls - volume-up and volume-down - so I press the up button - to what can only be guessed at will be an ok level (there being no level indicators on the supa-hi-fi box of tricks) - there is the sound of flying helicopters - the one-minute warning flare is fired - screaming alerts echo - and then the loudest explosion I have actualy ever witnessed is thrown from the monstoruous speakers onto the unsuspecting audiance - it was so loud we are still discussing wether we actually saw or imagined a flash of light in the almost pitch-black room - both me and Duncan look at each other mouths open in amazment at what occured - below - a stunned and visably shocked audiance slowly regain some control - and applaud - trust me - when you have had the chance of performing audio on a system like that - there aint no turning back.... bloody fantastic !!

Sunday 19th (all day long)
South Somerset Green Fair - for the second year I ran the music tent (Ok last year we did not actuall use a tent but a village hall - ok not really a hall more a converted church, but I am sure ya get the picture -yep, nope , what the heck) - yesterday was a blistering 30 degrees if not more all day long - out in the sun for over 12 hours - downing cider, toking on weed and having a grand old time as it goes - Kid Shirt, his good lady, Kid Kid Shirt and indeed Kid Kid Kid Shirt all came forthe fun - music highligts being the excellent El Dopa the Ska Punk joys offered by Dyslecsick - but outstanding festival award - and thrill to boys and girls alike must go to the 9 gals - who for 10 minutes performed a routine of belly dancing that will be remebered and indeed played over in the minds of all that saw for many years to come - nice one girls !!

This week I am on holiday - no-one is allowed to play anything remotly loud, musical,non-musical or indeed speak to me - as I am looking for some PEACE AND QUIET --- Thank you ....