BOULDERDASH: stones, drones & noise // issue #2
The summer solstice marked the release of the bumper second issue of the wonderful Boulderdash – a zine for enthusiasts of stones, drones and noise.
I’m very grateful indeed to Jessica Beechey for welcoming me to contribute a 6-page feature in a packed issue of writings, projects and works by a whole wealth of talented people across the creative arts.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F78d808e6-8cc1-4542-9b2c-c0b6035a7624_2562x2562.jpeg)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3ff6e71b-ba90-422b-acbc-c2425f0116c3_3024x3024.jpeg)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F23c33ff4-8c39-4246-8022-82daeda4f4b5_3024x3024.jpeg)
‘The Shepard Tone Cave Phenomena’ is a written piece which recalls a reverie of an afternoon spent collecting field recordings on the moorland of Minions, Cornwall. It is accompanied by a series of photographs and the drone track ‘A Trance Cave’.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5e150a8e-f529-4aa2-b449-b72c3e7fe9c8_3264x2448.jpeg)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2344df9f-4779-4e7c-9702-206e5283e227_3264x2448.jpeg)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa2b077f6-0235-44cb-9b90-4c6adf943f86_2272x1704.jpeg)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_720,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa3cbbd3c-016d-4ad2-80a2-ee16df5b7015_1588x1704.jpeg)
Boulderdash Zine is available to purchase and support from the following places:
MEANS magazine
MEANS is a magazine dedicated to underground, experimental, and intermedial arts and culture. Working with a community-led, artist-first model, MEANS aims to restore power to artists, and seeks to encourage fair renumeration for the work they do. To find out more about MEANS and how you can get involved, please check out the MEANS website.
I am grateful to have had the opportunity to contribute some writing to the site in recent months, some of which includes:
David Curington – Screen Time
This is not music for airports (digital zine, BIG MEANS Vol 1 – Open Scores)
Jean-Baptiste Del Amo – The Son of Man
Networked lives: navigating interstitial online spaces in times of disquiet
Ryefield Society / James A. McDermid – S’accommoder | Perdido
Guesswork – Laughter Valve / Unhappy Paths
The Absence Of Milk In The Mouths Of The Lost: A film by Case Esparros
Thee Alcoholics – Feedback
Recent sound works
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Feda05525-937f-4eaa-9ced-70c24c89cbc5_1200x1200.jpeg)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8e01af28-c1b6-4b64-bea6-660eea45af6f_1200x1200.jpeg)
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_474,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fdf72d56d-b142-4e98-851a-04b988e94fdc_1200x1200.jpeg)
carried by all the hands forgotten in the wind / mirror sky
A double album inspired by dream spaces and moments where our inner and outer experiences combine to create new form.
‘Sometimes you wish you were the same as yesterday.’
hush become a bright nowhere
Each of the five pieces that collectively make up ‘hush become a bright nowhere’ can possibly be considered tone poems or extracts from a diary or scrapbook, combining to form an evocation of thoughts, feelings and ideas on such things as expression of free will, the push-pull of relationships, the artist’s muse and the power of nature as poetic devices.
out of the ash
out of the ash was inspired by creation from out of adversity. Building something new from parts old, broken or abandoned. As a thematic bricolage, the sounds that emerge from these collage soundscapes seek to be reborn and revitalised as something new. A big thank you to Nick at Histamine Tapes for putting this one out on tape with excellent hand-made collage j-cards.
Lapsus memoriae
The latest CAMP Radio show aired on 29 June on listen.camp and is available to listen back over on CAMP Radio’s Mixcloud.
The next show will air on 27 July.
Sounds
Just some of the excellent releases that have been soundtracking the switch from spring to summer.
David Curington – Screen Time [Eustress Tapes]
Ryefield Society / James A. McDermid – S'accommoder / Perdido [rohs! records]
l'arbre nu – you are everywhere and here. a compilation of songs 2019-2023 / Lavallot tape collage [self release]
Robert Turman - Live in Middlesbrough [Industrial Coast]
the concept horse – more meaningful algebra [Molt Fluid]
f5point6 – A World Within Our World [See Blue Audio]
Hiroyuki Ura / Zhu Wenbo – Jyunishi 十二支 [Aloe Records]
The Shadow Ring – The Shadow Ring (1992-2002) [Blank Forms]
Aeson Zervas – s/t [Heat Crimes]
Bill Nace – Clips II [Ultra Eczema]
Hana Stretton – Soon [P.W. Elverum and Sun]
Lexie Carroll – you look lovely when you're living [sevenfoursevensix]
gglum – The Garden Dream [Secretly Canadian]
Broadcast - Spell Blanket - Collected Demos 2006-2009 [Warp Records]
Tam Lin – bluelightnospaceflattime [Flaming Pines]
Thom Yorke – Confidenza OST [XL Recordings]
naemi – Dust Devil [3 X L]
Keeley Forsyth – The Hollow [FatCat Records]
Shadow Pattern – Chimerism [adhuman]
Guesswork – Laughter Valve / Unhappy Paths [Square Ears]
Cabbaggage – Neuroaverse [Human Geography Recordings]
JOANNE ROBERTSON & DEAN BLUNT – BACKSTAGE RAVER [Self release]
Charlie XCX – Brat [Atlantic Records]
John Cage / Aaron Dilloway – Rozart Mix [Hanson Records]
Leo Okagawa – Density [DISSIPATIO]
Lucy Liyou – +82 K-Pop Star [Self release]
Other texts
Jean-Baptiste Del Amo – The Son of Man [Fitzcarraldo Editions]
Wyl Menmuir – The Heart of the Woods [Aurum]
[fragment]
I stopped the audio recording and began listening back to the saved file. It began sounding like a lost Basinski tape loop formed from microscopic flecks of static. After several moments listening to heavy saturated silence, patterns of damp distortions started dancing in the dark, gradually being pushed further into the red to evoke extreme levels of ambient noise wall. I braced myself against a boulder and tried to pick out emerging details from the wild static, as if I was attempting to capture a single still frame from a Brakhage film in my mind. A low thrumming became present, rapidly rising and falling in pitch, before being punctured by incessant chirping and squeaking oscillating around that familiar sharp Shepard tone.
– Extract from 'Notes From the Field: The Shepard Tone Cave Phenomena' from Boulderdash zine, issue #2