The Sound Projector

Couldn’t resist putting up a photo of this colourful package of goodies which arrived in late January to brighten my day. It was sent by the Swedish sound-artist Jean-Louis Huhta. That’s his visage on the striking cover of the seven inch single, an image rendered by Ola Åstraud; Ola is apparently “now curating shows with artists from 70s progg movement and forwards”, as Huhta explains in his enclosed letter. You may recall we reviewed his fine CD Halfway Between the World and Death (SLOTTET SLM5) in the current issue. In return he sent me the first-ever CD by OCSID called In Between (ORIGIN OR 2002) ; SKKULL by The Skull Defekts (RELEASE THE BATS RTB#23), those roaring noisesters Rylander and Nordwall (Huhta joined them for this 2006 release), and a CDR of his solo work recorded in Soderhamn Theater in 2007 (DFK REC 01). “I think there were about seven in the audience,” reports multi-media man Huhta. “I had a huge screen showing a film super 8 about concrete skate park construction.” It’s not all noise and concrete parks, though – the package also contained a copy of issue 6 of KUTI, the splendid broadsheet comic from Finland; a packet of seed for making your own Absolut Vodka; various promo stickers; and a plastic red watch branded with images of a masked superhero. “Just wanted to say I really like The Sound Projector,” Huhta wrote me in January. “The coverage is amazing! Strange that I have never come across it before. All good record stores here in Stockholm have shut down more or less.” “We’ve got the same problem in London,” I responded tartly. “It’s not just music, it has become very difficult for independent businesses to compete with Starbucks and so forth. Maybe retailing will be a thing of the past soon!” “Yes, we are in a critical moment,” pondered the profound sonic Swede. “It’s interesting, it’s like nature somehow, and nature nowadays is so affected (infected) by our actions.”

This personalised New Year’s greeting arrived in January from Aiko Machida. She makes “unique hand-constructed accessories and hand bags”, but I appreciate this small and simple item as a piece of mail-art poetry. I think it’s the petal of a flower, with a message inside handwritten with a pencil in the most delicate miniature lower-case script you’ve ever seen. Machida may or may not be a member of Unseen. When I receive things like this in the mail, I sometimes think I must be living a charmed life.

The Sound Projector 8ighth Issue, originally published in 2000 and out of print for some years, can now be perused in digital form. Sometimes nicknamed ‘THE EL LISSITZKY ISSUE’ or ‘ONE MORE RED NIGHTMARE’. Scanned direct from the original artwork and rendered as PDFs. A new index has been added to this digital edition. Contains interviews with those noted geniuses Pita Rehberg, Rev Dwight Frizzell, Reynols, Peter Blegvad, Donald Miller and John Gill of Big Stick. Excellent written contributions from Rik Rawling, Richard Rees Jones, Chris Atton, Harley Richardson, John Bagnall, Ian Nagoski, Jim Haynes, Shaun Robert, War Arrow, and the very first appearance of Jennifer Hor. Artworks by Scott Stevens, Rik Rawling, Chris Atton, Shaun Robert, Ed Pinsent and Donald Miller. This digital edition is almost an exact facsimile of the original, except that one page of adverts has gone missing, and artist Ian Middleton declined to have his drawings reproduced on the internet at this time.

A small technical note: the PDF files are images, so the text will not be searchable in your PDF reader. A version in plain text will be made available in due course.

Published November 2007. A fish in the air of geometrical appreciation. Climb the Astronomical Staircase. 184 pages. £7.00 + postage. Interviews with PHILIP SANDERSON, TETUZI AKIYAMA, FRANK ROTHKAMM, JOE FRAWLEY, CULTURAL AMNESIA and UNSEEN, plus scads of record reviews and artworks from cover to cover.

What content be herein?
Purchase it ye may

Don’t forget to go to the London Musicians’ Collective Experimental Music Festival in London this year. It starts on 29th November 2007 and ends on 1st December - the same year! What a way to mark the changing of the months. If you live in London, it’s at the Cochrane Theatre in Southampton Row. If you don’t live in London, it’s still at the same venue, only more wood panelling is involved. I remember I went to one of these LMC festivals a few years ago and it was quite good. They used to be held in May, and now they aren’t. This year features some of my favourite musicians. The larger-than-life Charlemagne Palestine will be skied over from Belgium in a big tea-chest. For his music he has often covered a grand piano with lots of soft toys. When he did it in Gateshead for Barry Esson’s festival, they had to buy the animals specially from a local shop called Bear Heaven. But on this occasion he’ll be doing his double-harpsichord piece. Taku Sugimoto will also be performing, but barely. I understand he’s so quiet these days that you have to use inbuilt sonar devices you never knew you had just to say good morning to him. If he brings his guitar, chances are it’ll be wrapped in cotton wool. Angharad Davies is the sister of Rhodri Davies the harpist from Wales. I never heard the sister play, but if she’s anything like the brother then you’ll be skinned alive by the severity of her strings – assuming she plays a stringed instrument, that is. Norbert Möslang is the Swiss noiseter who used to be one half of Voice Crack. He was more fun back in the 1980s and 1990s, but even so the way he wields his weird electronic devices usually makes the mice come out to see what all the commotion is. The UK contingent features the reliable player John Butcher, the saxophonist who can empty a warehouse of cardboard boxes with one blow of his steel monster. There’s plenty more names on offer: Steve Beresford, Yasunao Tone, Bob Levene, Julia Eckhardt, Michael Duch, Robin Hayward, Matt Davis, Tony Buck, Burkhard Stangl, Margarida Garcia, Barry Weisblat and Helena Gough. There may be exciting combinations of players the likes of which you will have not have encountered since Derek Bailey’s Company Week, where there used to be fist-fights breaking out on a regular basis. You can get a Festival Pass to enjoy all three days for only £35, which is about the price of two sandwiches in the V&A cafeteria. So what are you waiting for?

The Sound Projector Radio Show will once again be vershming out on the airwaves with many a zooming grort. Starting Friday 28th September, same time, same station. Tune in to Resonance at 5.30pm and leave the landlubbers laying down below below below. Utilise thy ears o’steel for 90 mins. Back to regular service thereafter and we hope regular podcasts from this locale, all things being equal. My Prince Consort doth exude a heavy glow at the prospect. As the crow flies…and with good caws…

The Sound Projector 16th issue is in preparation. Your hard-working writers have been busy since July, which is why the regular Latest arrivals feature on this site has been in abeyance. We hope, in due course, to resume normal service with weekly updates about the hottest tomatoes and kumquats to have landed in The Sound Projector box of late.

We are now taking advertising for issue 16. Please contact me before end of October 2007 if you wish to place an advert in issue 16. The current rates and other information are available here. Please note that the back cover space is already taken.

Issue 16 is now sadly full up and closed to new submissions of promos. Your CD submissions, gratefully received, will now be carried forward for consideration in issue 17.

The attached picture is not the proposed cover art, but a rendering of an advert we hope to place in the forthcoming Bixobal magazine.

Here be a fine selection of choice Turkish psychedelic, garage and early prog music from the 1960s and 1970s. Show was assembled by the nimble fingers of apprentice shipwright John Bagnall. Originally broadcast in September 2006 and has, I believe, proven fairly popular with all who hear it. It’s a pretty rockin broadcast. The attached drawing is of a man with a fez. Full playlist is available. Erkin Koray is as hot as a glass of naneruhu, but Mogollar are my personal gözdes!

The Sound Projector radio show,
originally broadcast on Resonance 104.4 FM

Resonance FM intend to resume normal scheduling in early September. We hope to continue to bring you The Sound Projector Radio Show after 3rd September 2007. Until then, keep checking back here for updates to the podcasts as we find more shows for your delectation from the back catalogue.

Kind Regards

Ed Pinsent (Editor)

Dear listeners

Tune in tomorrow (Friday 6th July) to hear my last live radio show for a few weeks. Resonance FM are moving to new premises, in the hopes of re-opening in early August this year. In the interim period, I gather that repeat shows may be broadcast. We’ll try and shuffle around the podcasts on the site here as well, for your listening pleasure.

Kind regards

Ed Pinsent