Available to listen to and buy at Bandcamp
Release date: 22 May 2025
Format: digital download. Artwork and typography by Landschaft.
Hunters of the Boreal Forest: Creswell Crags, tucked away in a quiet corner of the Nottighamshire Derbyshire border insired me to make this suite of shorter pieces. The limestone, fortuitously eroded by galcial meltwaters and caves in the sides of the gorge; a ready water supply and an ample hunting ground drew our ancestors to this site. The evidence of occupation left by the paleolithic hunter gatherers has been extensively documented, though the earlier excavations, typical of their type were informed perhaps more by Victorian kleptomania than scientific inquiry, and much of the archeology has been lost. Subsequent excavations have however revealed much from the remaining detail, and the small musuem at the site tells the story.
Christopher Smiths excellent 'Late Stone Age Hunters of the British Isles' provided further stimulous and many of the works are based upon my exploration of the themes he covers. The album title is drawn from the picture Smith paints of our early ancestors in their harsh, dark world. The story of the Poulton Elk, in particular fascinates me. It's bones discovered more or less intact are peppered with flint micro-lith arrow heads. The Elk did not yield to a swift death, as the forensic archeology makes clear.
This is my first work wholly incorporating hardware analog synthesis. Two Moog Mother 32 and a single Moog Subharmonicon are the sole instruments used, variously triggered by a euclidian sequencer and a number of randomisers generating modulation movement. The Subharmonicon provides poly-rhythmic progressions and six oscillators of the synchronised chord building the 'Sub' is so good at. Each of the works are single-take live captures with very little human intervention. The sequencers provide the modulation evolution of the timbres. A littel post production was added and gain balancing was carried out to make the works consistent as a collection.