Category: AYITC: Year 5

Artwork from Hand of Stabs’ Black-Veined White album.

“Black-Veined White takes as its starting point the eponymous butterfly which was last seen in the UK in Rochester, the area in which HoS work and explore, in the 1920s…

…it utilises precise textual descriptions of the Black-Veined White by L. Watson and M.J. Dallwitz alongside poetry that considers these ‘air wraiths’ by Giles Watson, to create a journey whereby Hand of Stab’s hidden drones and textures create a form of (non-electronic) electronica played on and summoned from the land and soil, a journey which captures and summons the spirit of these winged creatures that have now departed from our shores.

Black-Veined White and the work of Hand of Stabs is a very particular, otherly form of cultural exploration and inquiry whereby the aggressive transgression of the likes of COUM Transmissions, Throbbing Gristle and early Einstürzende Neubauten has evolved and spread deeply foraging roots to create work that is more pastoral in its themes but still very far from the centre of things.” (Quoted from A Year In The Country.)

“Hand of Stabs, from the South East of England, are a three-man collective who’s work draws inspiration from their exploration of local, often forbidden, landmarks. They create improvised sound pieces which can be simultaneously uplifting, difficult and intense using both traditional and homebuilt instruments.

Sharing a love of the history and sacred past of Medway Towns and surrounding countryside, and inspired by regular, often night-time walks through these spaces, they are creating a series of soundworks evoking and celebrating their essence.” (Quoted from Hand of Stabs.)

Hand of Stabs are currently having something of a hiatus. The poster for their final performance before that began is above.

As an image it seems to capture a sense of melancholy, reflection and the dock history of the Medway Towns particularly well, which rather suits Hand of Stabs background/inspirations and the nature of a “valedictory aktion”.

 

More details on Black-Veined White here and at Bandcamp.

Visit Hand of Stabs here.

 

Elsewhere at A Year In The Country:

1. Day #155/365: Hand of Stabs… delving amongst the soil and roots for the hidden stories of the land…
2. Day #349/365: Audiological Reflections and Pathways #2; the semi-random placing of England’s hidden reverse…
3. Audiological Transmission #26/​​52​​: Black-Veined White (Excerpt #1) – Hand of Stabs

 

This is Part 2 of a post on The Disruption, a booklet published by Texte und Töne that contains a conversation between the authors and academics Andy Beckett and Roger Luckhurst on the television series The Changes which was first broadcast on British television in 1975.

Part 1 of the post can be viewed here.

Below is a continuation of a selective precis of some of the main themes and topics discussed in The Disruption, alongside comments on some of their conversation on the series. Unless otherwise stated sections in italics are direct quotes from the publication:

One of the recurring themes in The Disruption is a reassessment of the history of the late 1960s through to the late 1970s and how it was an ongoing time of experimentation and liberalism to a certain extent within society and culture, rather than as is often suggested such things reaching a peak in 1968 and then there being a well-defined schism and decline afterwards.

They comment that such liberalism was present within institutions such as The BBC in terms of “permitting experiments and allowing the pushing of boundaries here and there” which resulted in the commissioning of work such as The Changes and Penda’s Fen. It could also be found to a degree and at times in the government of the day; Home Secretary Roy Jenkins approved the organisation of free festivals despite being informed by his civil servants of the substance taking and minor law-breaking that went on at such gatherings, with official documents at the time focusing more on the potentially beneficial social aspects for their young attendees, as long as “they didn’t get out of hand“.

Within The Disruption they propose that such benign, patrician “establishment liberalism” had a high water around 1974-1976 which was accompanied by a:

“…not necessarily showy avant-garde, but almost like an experimentalism of the everyday – in living, in politics, in art…”

Going on to say that:

“Thatcher casts this huge shadow and we have only remembered a certain kind of rebellion – often rather aggressive and dramatic – as if those are the only ones that counted.”

Such experimentalism in day-to-day life could be seen to be reflected within mainstream television programmes such as The Good Life (1975-1978) in which a previously conventional couple drop out of the “rat race” and attempt to live self-sufficiently in their suburban home – a quiet, gently, ongoing way of living counter to the mainstream rather than the brash confrontation of punk.

“The apocalypse is over by episode two. And you know what, it’s pretty much okay. We’ll get back to riding around on horses and black smything… We’re back to the English post-apocalyptic pastoral (and) the sort of rural loveliness a lot of counter-cultural people wanted in the 1970s and which made them leave cities… The reality was often a lot colder and muddier, a lot harder.”

In The Disruption it is noted how the journey in The Changes is towards the West of England, which was seen at the time by both some hippies and members of the ruling establishment as a form of sanctuary, while the likes of The Changes, Day of the Triffids, The Death of Grass are “post apocalyptic fictions saturated in melancholic reflection on Englishness.”

Within The Disruption Beckett and Luckhurst also ask if the contemporary interest in the flipside of the pastoral within culure and related DVD etc reissues are just about nostalgia as a result of a certain generation arriving at a position where they can intervene in or commission cultural production and have thier childhood memories immortalised? Or is there more at play:

“…1970s nostalgia has some particular qualities. To a lot of people, a Seventies childhood, whether they had one or not, represents freedom: roaming around unsupervised by adults, less dominated by cars than now, not kept indoors by computers… One of the strengths of The Changes is the way it makes childhood seem both frightening and incredibly exciting, almost limitless with possibilities.”

As discussed in the booklet, Public Information Films at the time were in part a reflection of the freedom which children enjoyed at the time without adult supervision and so they needed to be warned off railway tracks and away from electricity substations, farms and factories.

And as I also discuss in the A Year In The Country: Wandering Through Spectral Fields book, as with The Changes, such instructional films could be seen as being produced during a period when “society was battling over its future shape, order and social consensus”.

Which essentially is one of the main and possibly core themes of The Disruption; that The Changes is a reflection and product of such transitional, unsettled times and so as we are currently living through an in some ways not dissimilar time of turbulence, such programmes, films, themes etc have become a new mirror or lens through which to view our own contemporary time, worries, troubles and preoccupations.

The Disruption is the ninth in a series of books and booklets published by Texte und Töne. All their releases have been Risograph printed, which as I have mentioned at A Year In The Country before utilises a form of digital reproduction that exists somewhere inbetween photocopying and screenprinting. The resultant print quality has a lovely, tactile mat finish and almost handcrafted feel to it, with slight variations and blemishes here and there.

As with previous publications, the design is by Rob Carmichael of SEEN, with The Disruption including images from The Changes reconfigured in dark gold and maroon collages which in their use of abstract and strikingly abruptly placed shapes brings to mind the work of Julian House of Ghost Box Records / Intro design agency.

 

Elsewhere:

1. Texte und Töne’s site.
2. The Changes at the BFI.
3. The Changes DVD release.

Elsewhere at A Year In The Country:

1. Day #15/365. The Twilight Language Of Nigel Kneale
2. Penda’s Fen and The Edge Is Where The Centre Is – Explorations of the Occult, Otherly and Hidden Landscape: Wanderings, Explorations and Signposts 2/52
3. David Peace, Texte und Töne, The Stink Still Here and Spectres from Transitional Times – Part 1: Wanderings, Explorations and Signposts 16/52
4. David Peace, Texte und Töne, The Stink Still Here and Spectres from Transitional Times – Part 2: Wanderings, Explorations and Signposts 17/52
5. Robin Redbreast, The Ash Tree, Sky, The Changes, Penda’s Fen, Red Shift and The Owl Service – Wanderings Through Spectral Television Landscapes: Chapter 11 Book Images
6. The Changes / The Disruption – Notes on a Flipside of the Pastoral Conversation – Part 1: Wanderings 5/52

 

Artwork from Grey Frequency’s Immersion album.

“The phrase that comes to mind when I think of Grey Frequency’s work is broken signals; a scanning or overview of the ghosts in the airwaves, transmissions discovered via edgeland explorations and forays…

…when I listen to Immersion it feels like a capturing of activity hidden deep below the surface of things, the inexorable power of nature and it’s movement/force against it’s own edifices and those of civilisation over many years; a capturing of the sound of those self-same rending and collapsing into the below. Lovely stuff.” (Quoted from A Year In The Country).

More details on the album here and at Bandcamp.

Visit Grey Frequency’s site here.

 

Elsewhere at A Year In The Country:

1. Day #192/365: When Do We Dream? Cold Geometries and Grey Frequencies
2. Grey Frequency’s Agrarian Lament Video: Artifact Report #23/52a
3. Audiological Transmission #50​/​52: The Quietened Bunker – Comms: Seen Through The Grey / Revisitation #4a
4. Week #49/52: The Wanderings Of Veloelectroindustrial
5. Audiological Transmission #30​/​​​​​52​​: The Quietened Bunker – Drakelow Tunnels
6. Audiological Transmission #25/​​52​​: Immersion – Coastline, Black Sky
7. Day #346/365: Audiological Reflections and Pathways #1; a library of loss
8. Day #362/365: Signals sent, signals received…

 

Well, the start of a new yearly cycle of A Year In The Country (and good cheer to you all!)…

…in order to draw a line between previously visited pastures and new harvestings, I thought to begin with The Disruption, a publication that focuses on the 1975 television series The Changes…

As I have referred to before at A Year In The Country one of the interesting things with the relatively quite small and compact area of 1970s folk horror and related otherly pastoral/hauntological television and film is that points of cultural interest in regards to them are now often not purely the actual programmes etc themselves but also includes work they have influenced and inspired people to make.

Which brings me to the just mentioned The Disruption, which is a booklet published by Texte und Töne that contains a conversation between the authors and academics Andy Beckett and Roger Luckhurst on the also just mentioned television series The Changes.

In the series a strange sound inhabits the brains of the inhabitants of Britain and drives them to destroy and fear any modern technology, leading to societal collapse and a return to medievalism. The story is told via a schoolgirl who has become separated from her parents and who sets off on a quest across the countryside to reunite with them and ultimately solve the mystery of what has caused these extreme disruptions. During the series England is shown to have become a place of authoritarian medieval hierarchy, roving gangs and witch hunts.

Along the way it takes in her finding a temporary surrogate home away from the city with a group of wandering Sikhs and she is accused of sorcery by a witch-finder. Ultimately it is discovered that The Changes are due to the awakening of a sentient lode-stone which had once given magical powers to Merlin and which is now trying to take England back to a better time, before the Industrial Revolution, when people were more at one with nature and each other.

Below are presented some of the main themes and topics discussed in The Disruption – essentially in part a selective precis, alongside comments on some of their conversation on The Changes. Unless otherwise stated sections in italics are direct quotes from the publication:

“It travels to the same dark and anti-pastoral territory as David Rudkin/Alan Clarke’s Penda’s Fen (1974) and the Nigel Kneale scripted Murrain (1975).”

While taking the series as its initial starting point, in part booklet is a discussion about the general social, cultural and political background in which the programme was made and broadcast, in particular in relation to the counter-culture in Britain from the 1960s and 1970s in terms of hippies and alternative ways of life and how that continued in some ways into the 1990s (re crusties, travellers, the Peace Convoy etc).

“The appearance of Merlin at the end of The Changes is another… older element, a return to an English mystical tradition that’s trying to find something underneath modernity.” 

Although expressed via an apocalyptic occurrence in society, in part The Changes could be seen as a reflection of an early 1970s yearning to return to the land and simpler more wholesome times and ways, of rediscovering the pastoral, folk music and culture.

In the series the characters have had to flee for their lives from the cities and they find themselves in a landscape that is in some ways a pleasant rural idyll, the apocalypse it presents seems almost gentle and society seems to largely fairly easily move back to:

“…it’s quite nice out there where they’ve taken refuge: high summer, archetypal English landscapes – the sort of rural loveliness a lot of counter-cultural people wanted in the 1970s, and which made them leave the cities, to try to find more mellow and fulfilled lives in Gloucestershire or Wales.”

In their conversation Beckett and Luckhurst consider how the attack on technology in The Changes echoes the attacks made on the new automated looms and the resultant crisis in mill labour in the 1810s and the ways in which such things connect with and reflect the turmoil of the 1970s in the West:

“…all of this evokes the end of the long postwar boom… the oil crisis and a sense of impending disaster, and it appears in popular culture in strange places… those anxieties billow out into popular culture, but it’s clearly there in children’s literature and TV too.”

They draw comparisons between the mid-1970s and the state of flux which British society is in and today where after the stability of the Major and Blair years – approximately the early 1990s until the current economic crisis began around 2007 –  it is now hard to predict the future and we are living in a time of uncertainty.

Because of this they propose that the worries, catastrophes and England on the edge of disaster of the likes of The Changes, The Survivors (1975-1977) and the final Quatermass series (1979), alongside the spectral, supernatural unearthings of The Stone Tape (1972) and also loosely related unsettled pastoral work, such as the triumvirate of folk horror films that includes Witchfinder General (1968), Blood on Satan’s Claw (1971) and The Wicker Man (1973), fit our era much better than they might have done ten years ago:

“It feels like there has been an embrace of catastrophe across the spectrum, alarmist on the left, almost welcoming on the right. I suppose this also makes sense of us wanting to re-watch that whole strand of 1970s apocalyptic films now, and also that the culture seems compelled to remake them.”

In this sense their theories connect with author and academic Robert Macfarlane’s comment in his article “The Eeriness of the English Countryside” that the current interest in the darker, eerie side of the landscape and pastoralism in culture may well be:

“..an attempt to account for the turbulence of England in the era of late capitalism. The supernatural and paranormal have always been means of figuring powers that cannot otherwise find visible expression. Contemporary anxieties and dissents are here being reassembled and re-presented as spectres, shadows or monsters…”

The interconnected nature of such work, both the original programmes and films and more contemporary writing, publications etc which have been inspired by them, is also reflected by the above observation by Robert Macfarlane  being quoted by Texte und Töne editor Sukhdev Sandhu in his introductory text for an edition of The Edge is Where The Centre Is, a publication also released by Texte und Töne which focused on the preternatural pastoral television drama Penda’s Fen (1974.)

Continued in Part 2 of this post (which depending on when you’re reading this post may not yet be viewable).

 

Elsewhere:

1. Texte und Töne’s site.
2. The Changes at the BFI.
3. The Changes DVD release.

Elsewhere at A Year In The Country:

1. Day #15/365. The Twilight Language Of Nigel Kneale
2. Penda’s Fen and The Edge Is Where The Centre Is – Explorations of the Occult, Otherly and Hidden Landscape: Wanderings, Explorations and Signposts 2/52
3. David Peace, Texte und Töne, The Stink Still Here and Spectres from Transitional Times – Part 1: Wanderings, Explorations and Signposts 16/52
4. David Peace, Texte und Töne, The Stink Still Here and Spectres from Transitional Times – Part 2: Wanderings, Explorations and Signposts 17/52
5. Robin Redbreast, The Ash Tree, Sky, The Changes, Penda’s Fen, Red Shift and The Owl Service – Wanderings Through Spectral Television Landscapes: Chapter 11 Book Images
6. The Changes / The Disruption – Notes on a Flipside of the Pastoral Conversation – Part 2: Wanderings 5/52
   (Please note: depending on when you’re reading this post, Part 2 may not yet be viewable.)

 

A selection of reviews, broadcasts and arrivals in records stores of The Corn Mother album:

“You want to see the film as described in the liner notes, and as conjured in the songs on the album, and that’s an incredible trick to pull off… This is hauntology – the genre, rather than the philosophical dystopic – in its finest form, where buried memories of film, TV, music, and life come to the surface, often unverifiable because the hard copy has been lost or was never properly recorded in the first instance.” Alan Boon, Starburst

“Gavino Morretti opens the creep casting ceremony courtesy of the suspense tingling ‘Ritual and Unearthly Fire’. With its slow clock tocking pensive, a sweetly sinister aura descends, dropping from its orbital station, this prowling ethereal spirals with a chill tipped kosmische flashing much recalling Carpenter’s more mellowed lunar recitals as found on ‘Lost Themes’ and with it bathing the landscape with a somewhat, calm before the storm, like lull.” Mark Barton, The Sunday Experience

“The sense of dark electronic menace continues through offerings (the term is used advisedly) by The Heartwood Institute, Sproatly Smith and Field Lines Cartographer, while Widow’s Weeds contribute bad trip acid-folk and ‘The Night Harvest’ by A Year In The Country themselves moves into Coil territory. This remarkably cohesive collection is shaping new nightmares from yesterday’s broken dreams.” Ben Graham, Shindig! magazine, issue 86.

“The Heartwood Institute arrive with the terrific wonky eerie electro of ‘Corn Dolly’… ‘The Keeper’s Dilemma’ by Depatterning (has) the feel of isolation, with a clanging bell that feels like it’s just reacting to wind… Sproatly Smith are ‘Caught in the Coppice’ (that) flutters and coo’s along to a ghostly tune… Let us hope for a good harvest next year.” Andrew Young, Terrascope

“Unsettling sonics are achieved with woozy synth pads and simple piano lines by Gavino Morretti’s ‘Ritual And Unearthly Fire”… Field Lines Cartographer end proceedings with a suitably chilling and swirling vortex of darkness.” Electronic Sound magazine, issue 48

“Halloween may be over but its spell for me always lingers… and albums such as this are especially suited to chill days, early twilights and long, dark nights.” John Coulthart, feuilleton

“United Bible Studies, who on this recording comprise band founder David Colohan alongside Dominic Cooper of The Owl Service and Alison O’Donnell of Mellow Candle and Flibbertigibbet, provide a chilling piece of incidental music in which otherworldly murmurs are interwoven with unsettling soundscaping… Depatterning combine found sounds with surreal electronics, the piece’s various sections drifting in and out in the manner of a dream… Widow’s Weeds includes former members of The Hare and the Moon; they contribute an exceptional dark folk track setting truly beautiful vocals to a chilling mix of woozy electronics and intense neoclassical film music… An engaging album in which the apparently disparate genres of folk music and experimental electronica sit perfectly well together as different expressions of the same basic idea.” Kim Harten, Bliss Aquamarine

 

And so on to some of the radio etc broadcasts…

The Keeper’s Dilemma by Depatterning was on episode 248 of More Than Human, alongside the likes of Pendulum, Leyland Kirby and Sone Institute. Originally broadcast on CiTR FM, the show is archived here.

The Heartwood Insitute’s Corn Dolly was on the There’s a Moment of Arrival episode of record label Sunrise Ocean Bender’s radio show, accompanied by amongst others Wooden Shjips, Jagjaguwar and the soundtrack to Beyond the Black Rainbow. Originally on WRIR FM, the show is archived here.

Field Lines Cartographer’s Procession at Dusk was included on Pete Wiggs’ and James Papademetrie’s phantom seaside radio show The Séance, in an episode that also included work by Michael Nyman, Sabres of Paradise, and Dave & Toni Arthur (y’kno’, from television show Play Away). Originally broadcast via Radio Reverb and Sine FM, the show is archived here.

In a rounding-the-circle manner Corn Dolly by The Heartwood Institute, Procession at Dusk by Field Lines Cartographer and Ritual And Unearthly Fire by Gavino Morretti were on the 9th December 2018 episode of the You, the Night & the Music radio show, which is hosted by Mat Handley of Pulselovers, whose track Beat Her Down appears on the album. Originally broadcast on Sine FM, the show is archived here.

Pulselovers Beat Her Down was included on Wyrd Daze/The Ephemeral Man’s Samhain Séance Seven: Aftermath, accompanied by Keith Seatman, Jean Michael Jarre, Sone Institute and Dead Can Dance. The episode is archived here.

Widow’s Weeds’ The Corn Mother was played amongst the flipside of folk and hauntological explorations of The Unquiet Meadow, on an episode which also included Goblin, Raymond Scott and John Carpenter. Originally broadcast on Asheville FM, the show’s playlist is here.

 

And then on to The Corn Mother’s appearance in online and bricks and mortar record stores:

The album is available instore and online at Manchester’s Piccadilly Records (nice to see with all the hours a certain member of A Year In The Country’s “staff” has spent in there over the years). Visit the album at Piccadilly Records here.

And The Corn Mother is available at Juno Records (and ditto the above about the number of hours a certain member of A Year In The Country’s “staff” has spent there over the years). Visit the album at Juno Records here.

The Corn Mother can also be found amongst the vastly eclectic stock and unearthings of Warp Records offshot Bleep. Visit it at Bleep here.

And finally it can also be found at Norman Records, who have given sterling support to the A Year In The Country releases over the years:

“Understated, pastorally inclined A Year in the Country release another charming collection in characteristic monochrome. Today’s folkloric ruminations concern the mysterious 1970s screenplay for a made-but-never-released horror film called The Corn Mother. Destroyed or squirrelled away somewhere, the film is, in effect, lost to the ages. It endures by its whispered reputation alone; enough to inspire eerie contributions from the likes of Gavino Moretti, Widow’s Weeds and Sproatly Smith.”

Visit the album at Norman Records here.

 

A tip of the hat to everybody concerned, much appreciated.

 

The Corn Mother: Reflections on an imaginary film;
“In the early 1970s a folk horror-esque screenplay made the rounds of the film industry but remained unmade until 1982… The film was completed but was never released and knowledge of the whereabouts of the footage became lost, though subsequent rumours suggest that it may even have been deliberately destroyed…”

The album features music by Gavino Morretti, Pulselovers, The Heartwood Institute, United Bible Studies (David Colohan, Dominic Cooper of The Owl Service, Alison O’Donnell of Mellow Candle), A Year In The Country, Widow’s Weeds (featuring former members of/collaborators with The Hare And The Moon), Depatterning, Sproatly Smith and Field Lines Cartographer. The album’s design and layout is by Ian Lowey.

The album is also available at our our Artifacts Shop, Bandcamp, Greedbag and Amazon.

A selection of tracks can be previewed at Soundcloud and Bandcamp.

 

The CDs are now sold out but the album is available to download at our Bandcamp page, Amazon, The Tidal Store, 7digital etc and can be streamed on Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer, YouTube etc.

Released today 4th December 2018. Price £12.95.
Available at our Artifacts Shop, Bandcamp and Greedbag. Also available at Norman Records, Piccadilly Records and Amazon.

Dawn Rising edition – factory pressed CD in matt 4-panel gatefold sleeve.

Features music by Gavino Morretti, Pulselovers, The Heartwood Institute, United Bible Studies (David Colohan, Dominic Cooper of The Owl Service, Alison O’Donnell of Mellow Candle), A Year In The Country, Widow’s Weeds (featuring former members of/collaborators with The Hare And The Moon), Depatterning, Sproatly Smith and Field Lines Cartographer.

Tracklisting:

It has recently been brought to our attention that Richard Moult, one of the music contributors to the A Year In The Country releases, had previous associations with an apparently small fringe organisation that holds and promotes extreme right views and that to some degree despite saying that he was no longer connected with the organisation he may have possible and alleged ongoing connections with it.

There is no space or place within A Year In The Country for such views; we find them abhorrent, repugnant and fundamentally reject them.

When we released music featuring his work we had no knowledge of his association with such a group nor of any related extreme former or possible ongoing political or other beliefs held by him nor of any related activities. At that time his solo and collaborative work had been released by literally dozens of record labels, none of which to our knowledge held or espoused such or similar extreme views and therefore we accepted the work in good faith.

While we are not able to corroborate the facts relating to this matter we do not wish in any way to be associated with such extreme views and therefore we have removed work by him from A Year In The Country and related sites. We have also applied to have any work by him released by A Year In The Country removed from any wider music downloading and streaming sites – although the completion of this removal process once submitted can take up to 30 days.

We have not released music containing work by him since March 2017 and will not be releasing any further work by him.

We also do not wish to give the ongoing air of publicity to such extreme views and therefore beyond this statement we will not be entering into further public or private debate about this matter.

Thank you.

A Year In The Country
29th November 2018

 

A selection of reviews, broadcasts etc of The Quietened Mechanisms album:

“The theme of the new collection is the end of Britain’s industrial revolution, a period of social and geological turmoil whose ruins still litter the landscape, especially in the Midlands and North of England. This isn’t industrial nostalgia… but an often poignant commemoration. Another impressive installment in this ongoing series.” John Coulthart, Feuilleton

“As ever impeccably packaged… . As with previous editions, these as were, epitaphs or nostalgia notations, uncover in the main, forgotten histories, whether forgotten through sheer neglect, conspiracy or misremembered, these moments or passages in time are locked in our fading subconscious much like fleeting apparitions or images disappearing over time whether by design or by way of a past rewritten. The quietened Mechanisms turns its scholarly gaze on forgotten technologies and with it hosts of gathering of 17 intrepid travelers along for the journey.” Mark Losing, The Sunday Experience

“A soaring soundbite of seismic and sensory sounds, this is one of the most arresting A Year In The Country releases yet – and one of the best!… Through sounds of aural and dystopic unease, tape loops and keyboards introduce listeners to the buzzing and humming an industrial factory makes. Drum patterns pedal over growls and loops tick time through the waves of weary wordless wages.” Eoghan Lyng, We Are Cult

“This volume explores abandoned, mostly derelict and long forgotten mills, factories and other infrastructure and paraphernalia of our industrial past, much of it slowly reclaimed by nature… Listening Centre’s Clarion Of The Collapsed Complex is really quite beautiful… a synthesized folk valediction to the rise and fall of industrialisation and all its human and structural collateral damage.” Ian Fraser, Terrascope

“Seventeen artists place themselves in the shadow of what remains, choosing sites that may not lay on the tourist maps, but await the explorer regardless… It’s an incredibly evocative experience, listening to this album.” Dave Thompson, Goldmine

“A Year In The Country and a selection of their regular musical contributors here turn their attention to abandoned factories and technology, spending an enraptured hour or so wandering among their ghosts… each track reflects a specific location, combining field recordings, musique concrete and spooked electronica into a strangely transporting whole.” Ben Graham, Shindig! magazine, issue 84

And then on to a selection of the radio etc broadcasts:

Tracks from the album including Listening Center’s Clarion of the Collapsed Complex were featured on Flatland Frequencies. Originally broadcast on Future Radio FM, the episode is archived at Mixcloud.

Keith Seatman’s Rural Flight was on Sunrise Ocean Bender. Originally broadcast on WRIR, the show is archived here.

And another broadcast of Listening Center’s Clarion of the Collapsed Complex on Pull the Plug. Originally broadcast on Resonance FM, the show is archived here.

Howlround’s A Closed Circuit was featured on Evening of Light’s Ἀρέθουσα’s Elysian Dreams #02 podcast (alongside David Colohan’s How We’ll Go Out from The Shildam Hall Tapes). Visit that here.

Vic Mars’ Watchtower and Engine and Field Line Cartographer’s The Mill in the Forest were featured on The Unquiet Meadow. Visit The Unquiet Meadow at Ashville FM here and playlists for the episodes here and here.

 

A tip of the hat to all concerned. Much appreciated.

 

The Quietened Mechanisms is an exploration of abandoned and derelict industry, infrastructure, technology and equipment that once upon a time helped to create, connect and sustain society.

It features music and accompanying text on the tracks by Howlround, Grey Frequency, Listening Center, Sproatly Smith, Embertides, Keith Seatman, Time Attendant, A Year In The Country, Dom Cooper, Field Lines Cartographer, Vic Mars, Depatterning, Pulselovers, Quaker’s Stang, The Heartwood Institute and Spaceship.

More details can be viewed here.

 

The CDs are now sold out but the album is available to download at our Bandcamp page, Amazon, The Tidal Store, 7digital etc and can be streamed on Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer, YouTube etc.

Preorder today 11th September 2018. Released 2nd October 2018. 

The album is an exploration of abandoned and derelict industry, infrastructure, technology and equipment that once upon a time helped to create, connect and sustain society.

It wanders amongst deserted factories, discarded machinery, closed mines, mills and kilns and their echoes and remains; taking a moment or two to reflect on these once busy, functioning centres of activity and the sometimes sheer scale or amount of effort and human endeavour that was required to create and operate such structures and machines, many of which are now just left to fade away.

Features music and accompanying text on the tracks by Howlround, Grey Frequency, Listening Center, Sproatly Smith, Embertides, Keith Seatman, Time Attendant, A Year In The Country, Dom Cooper, Field Lines Cartographer, Vic Mars, Depatterning, Pulselovers, Quaker’s Stang, The Heartwood Institute and Spaceship.

Available in two CD editions: Dawn Light edition £11.95. Nightfall edition £22.95.
CDs available via our Artifacts Shop, at Bandcamp and Norman Records.

Both editions are hand-finished and custom printed using archival giclée pigment ink by A Year In The Country.

Downloads will be available at Bandcamp,  iTunes, Amazon etc.

Dawn Light Edition. Limited to 104 copies. £11.95.
Hand-finished white/black CD album in textured recycled fold out sleeve with fold-out insert and badge.

Top of CD.                                                          Bottom of CD.

Further packaging details:
1) Custom printed using archival giclée pigment ink.
2) Includes 2.5 cm badge, secured with removable glue on string bound tag.
3) 1 x folded sheet of accompanying notes, hand numbered on back.

 

Nightfall Edition. Limited to 104 copies. £22.95
Hand-finished box-set contains: album on all black CD, 2 x sheets of accompanying notes, 1 print, 3 x stickers and 3 x badges.

Top of CD.                                                             Bottom of CD.

Further packaging details:
1) Cover, notes and print custom printed using archival giclée pigment ink.
2) Contained in a matchbox style sliding two-part rigid matt card box with cover print.
3) Fully black CD (black on top, black on playable side).
4) 2 x folded sheets of accompanying notes, printed on textured laid paper – one sheet hand numbered on back.
5) 1 x print on textured fine art cotton rag paper.
5) 1 x 2.5 cm badge, 1 x 4.5 cm badge.
6) 1 x 5.6 cm sticker, 1 x 3.5 cm sticker, 2 x 12cm stickers.

Tracklisting:

1) Birkby and Allbright Mine: The Heartwood Institute
2) The Hoffman Kiln: Quaker’s Stang
3) Of Looms in the Housen: Depatterning
4) Ash, Oak & Sulphur: Embertides
5) Metallurgy: Dom Cooper
6) The Mill in the Forest: Field Lines Cartographer
7) Nottingham Canal: Grey Frequency
8) A Closed Circuit: Howlround
9) Rattler to the Tower: The Soulless Party
10) Rural Flight: Keith Seatman
11) Clarion of the Collapsed Complex: Listening Center
12) The Stones Speak of Short Lives: Spaceship
13) Canary Babies: Sproatly Smith
14) Fuggles: Pulselovers
15) Hidden Parameters: Time Attendant
16) Watchtower and Engine: Vic Mars
17) The Structure/Respite: A Year In The Country