Another nice record from Mark Vernon, long-time TSP favourite. Call Back Carousel (DISCREPANT CREP102) exhibits and reaffirms a number of familiar tropes and concerns of this unique creator – the interest in obsolete analogue equipment, the rescue of abandoned tapes from the past, and likewise the rescue of voices from amateur tape-makers and home-movie makers from long ago.
Specifically, Vernon is zeroing in on the slide carousel, a set-up which I am now compelled to explain (as is he, in order to convey what he’s doing with this record) – it involved loading your holiday slides into the magazine of a projector which could rotate automatically and show them in a chosen sequence, and (if the home amateur was really clever) could synch up with a pre-recorded cassette tape, most likely a voice-over explaining each photo to the weary viewer in the dark. Many a visiting aunt and uncle have fallen asleep on the dralon sofa watching such a display, one must assume. It’s a selection of these tapes which Vernon has somehow managed to accrue as part of his vast collection of found recordings, and are now redeployed here – pretty much played straight through, although there are the subtle additions of music (played on wobbly cassettes), repeats, loops, and other tape treatments which he does with such care. Flickering images from the past thus come to life, through the creaky speaking voice of a retired gentleman making his banal observations on bird life in Paignton zoo or chatting with holidaymakers on the beach in Torquay.
It’s not just the obsolescence that interests Mark – I don’t know if 35mm Kodak slides are even made any more – but also these fascinating glimpses of ordinary British life which seem to come from a world that is all but vanished now. As ever, Vernon treats this material with sympathy, truly giving a “voice to the people” without a trace of condescension or irony. In fact, the more ordinary (for him) the better; he effortlessly sublimates it into art. I’ve probably mentioned them before in the context of a Mark Vernon review, but compare this with the work of the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players from Seattle, who tend towards a more ironic form of presentation, and it might be illustrative. Vinyl release with an extra track available for digital streamers. From 21 June 2023.