In part two we are joined by musician Laura Cannell. We explore her unique ancient folk inspired music that she creates with the violin overbow and double recorders. We talk fairy rings, witch eggs and groaning stones.
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Starting point. End point for today:
There has been lopping and sawing and cutting.
One of the mini-greenhouses was smashed beyond repair. I’ll finish assembling one single mini-greenhouse out of parts from two tomorrow. I got slowed down by discovering other jobs that needed doing along the way. All four apple trees are unexpectedly fruiting, so they needed weeding and mulching.
And, shockingly, the cherry tree is fruiting. I thought this was one of the figs at first, because I didn’t expect the cherry to live. I double checked with the plant app and it seems to be the cherry!
I also needed to attend to the berry plants – the strawberries are already starting to fruit. Seems I lost a few raspberry canes, and the peaches are probably beyond saving – they came out of dormancy too early so I couldn’t repot them, then they bloomed in fucking February, then it got cold again, and now they are confused and want to die. I intended to write tomorrow, but I need to repot some raspberry canes very fast, and some chives – just hoping I have enough compost left — and then feed everything.
Braeyden Jae, someone I’ve returned to a lot over the years. Track 3 stands out for that Galaxie 500-era guitar figure and scratch-shuffle. A very late-night sound, to me.
OPERATIONS: script, trailer notes round 2, tv doc, newsletter, development, eyestrain. Offline until I get hold of this.
READING: BEYOND THE LIGHT HORIZON, Ken MacLeod (UK) (US+)
ORBITAL:
MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter. Forthcoming 2024: THE DEPARTMENT OF MIDNIGHT, DESOLATON JONES: THE BIOHZARD EDITION. 2025: THE STORMWATCH COMPENDIUM.
- a pint of water with a shot of lemon juice in it
- 100g coconut-based yogurt with fresh berries, honey and almonds
- pea protein smoothie with frozen berries, oats, cacao and oat milk
- frozen watermelon juice if I remember (I don’t)
- plant-based wrap with hummus, salad leaves, tomato, cucumber, red pepper, herbs and a shredded chicken thigh
- kale and black grape juice made with 300ml water in the Nutribullet
- gluten-free rosemary crackers with cheese, an apple, walnuts
- chicken and rice in some form
- nutritional-powder smoothie with oats, oat milk and one frozen banana
This and trying to cut down on the smokes? But I need to cut weight after a long winter and keep the brain running fast, so this is the horror I live in for a while.
The thing about devoting some months to reading the things I meant to read years ago means that, sometimes, I sit down with a book and am furious with myself for not reading it twenty-five years ago, because it was everything I needed to know and needed to hear. This is one of those books.
It’s about the seeds and roots and emergences of ambient music, and Brian Eno is rarely mentioned. It goes really far and wide and granular, a huge work of scholarship and memory – because Toop is an experimental musician who was also a music journalist, and he met most of these radical composers and inventors. He goes everywhere:
“There’s a wonderful story about Taxi Driver”, says Schütze. “I think it was the first and only film where, when the censors saw the film, the only requirement they had in order to pass it for a screening certificate was a sound cut. What completely freaked them out was the fact that Walter Murch had taken the idea of the gun, which is a tremendously symbolic and disturbing thing, and he put cannon fire underneath the gunshots. So these gunshots are not a pop; these gunshots are like your lungs are blown out through the back of the theatre, which is probably what it would feel like if you were holding the gun. I think the censors realised that this was subjective sound from the character’s perspective. You were feeling the recoil because you were holding the gun, therefore you were empathising with Travis Bickle which is a deeply disturbing thing to realise you’re doing.”
I am so stealing that one day.
On reflection afterwards, the book seems to have a tidal structure – Toop goes all the way back to the mud, then rushes forward to the (then-current) shore – it was written in 1995.
There’s a wonderful sequence towards the end where Toop describes one of his journeys down the Amazon to meet and record shamans. Which had especial interest from me, because my partner has spent a lot of time with the Shipibo and the ayahuasceros (I got a similar jolt watching TAR, where Tar talks briefly about the Shipibo-Conibo and the icaros, the medicine songs, which she’s also described to me). We still pay for the villages she knows to throw a Christmas party every year.
And this line, my god:
That night I go to sleep listening to someone chanting a myth in the distance.
I made a lot of Kindle highlights, and am still tracking down and listening to all the unfamiliar work he references. It’s an absolute treasure chest of a book, and beautifully written.
OCEAN OF SOUND, David Toop (UK) (US+)
Chilly, rainy day. Hoping to get into the garden this weekend, not least so I can attend to these tomatoes.
OPERATIONS: Boards updated, Zooms set, one more coffee then it’s five straight hours of scripting followed by six hours of development work. Inbox 83, I’ll start processing tonight.
READING: FUTURE DAYS: Krautrock and the Building of Modern Germany, David Stubbs (UK) (US+)
LISTENING:
And now the doorbell and the spam calls are starting, so I’m off.
MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter. Forthcoming 2024: THE DEPARTMENT OF MIDNIGHT, DESOLATON JONES: THE BIOHZARD EDITION. 2025: THE STORMWATCH COMPENDIUM.