listen hear sound projects - audio diary

Outside my hotel room, in Prague, yesterday morning. The snow had just begun to fall and I’d just returned from breakfast to prepare for the day ahead. I have spent many weeks of my life over the past seven years in this great city. A source of some wonderful sounds. But, only this morning have I realised exactly what the signature sound of Prague is (certainly throughout the summer and any Friday night/Monday morning), it’s the unmistakable sound of suitcases and bags being wheeled across the cobbled streets by the many tourists arriving or departing. A familiar rhythmical clatter of plastic wheels upon the cobble stone roads and paths, a sound which I have produced myself in this city many times and one which can be heard about 33 seconds into this recording.

I’m uploading this sound not having really listened to it carefully myself, a risk I’m for once prepared to take, and something I should really do more often.

The view - sunshine between snow flurries.

8th Febuary 2010

9am

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A lovely Friday afternoon in Brighton.

Wandering around pretty aimlessly and stopped at a well known street corner café, one that used to be a particular favourite of mine, for a coffee and to write. Here’s some of the atmosphere which I enjoyed while I sat and watched the world pass by.

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A lazy Sunday, yesterday. Cinema, Chinese takeaway and a nap in front of the television. So anyway, the sound of a Prawn Cracker after it’s been dipped in Sweet and Sour sauce. No doubt, I’ll use this as something else in the future, perhaps one day it’ll be the basis of crackling fire?…in a theatre near you…who knows…what, where, how, when, why…

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The 3rd Birthday for this site…my 4th entry for January 23rd…

Thank you to everyone who’s subscribed, and everyone who just logs in from time to time.

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Waiting for a train at Manchester Piccadilly station on Saturday morning, enjoying a hot coffee, underscored by the constant monotonous drone of a waiting train and numerous announcements.

Saturday 9th January 2010

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A short video of yesterdays snow in North Manchester…

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My recorder was left switched on above my desk and this was the result….

Listening to Nick Cave, drinking tea and writing emails. A very rare New Years Eve away from Brighton…recovering from a Christmas cold and missing my south coast friends, but looking forward to some JD later!

Wishing everyone a happy, fulfilled and peaceful 2010.

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Like a lot of people I try to take a balanced view of politics and world affairs. I watch the BBC news, Channel 4’s usually excellent coverage of events, Rupert Murdoch’s Sky News and the alternative, online, Democracy Now, I read the Guardian, the Metro when travelling and the Washington Post, New York Times and Le Monde, I even been known to thumb the Daily Mail. I try to absorb as much mainstream and Indy media as I can in an often frustrating effort to make sense of the world in order to hopefully construct an informed opinion.

Like most of the world I’m of the opinion that the recent Copenhagen Climate Change summit was a disaster, it got off to a bad start and simply got worse.

One lasting memory of recent weeks and something which I hope isn’t a warning to us all was Barack Obama’s stuttering and unfocussed press conferences, (when he finally found time to honour this world gathering with his presence). Dare I say these reminded me of George W Bush at his finest/worst (delete as applicable).  He was totally unconvincing as he worryingly um’d, ah’d and paused his way through badly prepared speeches, seemingly and slightly disturbingly, completely unconvinced himself by the words he was uttering. His statements and presentations were monumentally disastrous. I want Obama to be a success and I share this hope with a great many millions across the world, but if Copenhagen is anything to go by then….but maybe this was just a blip. Although he actually summed up, perfectly, the whole event and the feelings shared by most of us following it with his absolute inability to appear, or sound, convincing.

This isn’t very festive post, and I apologise, but the words, gestures and manoeuvrings in Copenhagen have been ringing in my ears and playing on my conscience as I endlessly queue in shops and surf the internet searching for gifts for the people close to me, being a consumer, wasting resources and feeling guilty, as I have for many years whilst doing this. I try not to purchase goods from major chain stores, but sometimes I do, I try to shop in a way, and purchase products, which have a minimal negative effect on our environment, but sometimes I fail and always promise to myself to do better next year.

The dialogue I’ve used in the my piece below features Barrack Obama, Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman and The Guardians brilliant George Morbiot.

Whatever you believe and wherever you are I wish you…

Merry Christmas,

Happy Holidays,

Zorionak eta Urte Berri On!,

Bon Nadal i un Bon Any Nou!

Prejeme Vam Vesele Vanoce a stastny Novy Rok,

Hyvaa joulua, Joyeux Noel,

Fröhliche Weihnachten,

Idah Saidan Wa Sanah Jadidah, Buone Feste Natalizie,

Sung Tan Chuk Ha,

Feliz Navidad

Zalig Kerstfeest en Gelukkig nieuw jaar,

Nadolig Llawen,

Vrolijk Kerstfeest en een Gelukkig Nieuwjaar!

Nodlaig mhaith chugnat, Maligayan Pasko!

And a peaceful 2010.

And maybe we could all do worse than spend just a little time over this holiday period reflecting on our responsibilities towards the planet which we’re currently charged with looking after.

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/climate-change/changethefuture

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The short walk, through snow and slush with a bag full of Christmas gifts, from the tram station to my ‘up north’ flat.

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Walking home from the theatre I stumbled upon the Illuminated Art Car Parade gathering in Cathedral Gardens, outside Urbis. Some fantastic machines and as always I can’t help but admire the skill, effort, time (and no doubt money) that has gone into creating these wonderful machines.

Fantastic.

26^th November 2009

17.45

Latitude 53°29′8.34″N

Longitude 2°14′33.34″W

…and only the camera on my phone…..

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A crazy storm, in Brighton, on Saturday lunchtime, recorded from inside my flat. The rain starts to find a way through the window frame (somehow! Worrying) and hits my microphone towards the end.

12.30pm - 14th November 2009

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Framework:afield

Continuing the recent ‘radio’ theme here’s my recent interview which was broadcasted on the stations below. I’m responding to questions from producer Karen Lauke (http://www.karenlauke.com). You can listen to Karen’s programme in full at any of the below or, http://www.archive.org/details/2009.11.08FrameworkRadio

It also features an excellent interview with the Ewan Stefani.

/*framework*/ - phonography / field recording; contextual and decontextualized sound activity presented by patrick mcginley

/*framework*/ broadcasts:

    - sunday, 10pm, london, uk on *resonance 104.4fm* (http://www.resonancefm.com)

    - tuesday, 2pm, london, uk on *resonance 104.4fm* (http://www.resonancefm.com)

    - wednesday, 12am, thessaloniki, gr on *cooradio* (http://www.cooradio.com)

    - wednesday, 3am, lisbon, pt on *radio zero* (http://www.radiozero.pt)

    - thursday, 7pm, lisbon, pt on *radio zero* (http://www.radiozero.pt)

    - friday, 1am, brussels, be on *radio campus 92.1fm* (http://www.radiocampusbruxelles.org)

    - saturday, 5pm, south devon, uk on *soundartradio 102.5fm* (http://www.soundartradio.org.uk)

*for general info, playlists, podcasts, or to stream the latest edition at any time: http://www.frameworkradio.net * *framework is supported by /soundtransit/: http://www.soundtransit.nl *

Framework and all of the stations listed above are excellent and deserve our support!

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When I was young I loved the radio. I used to spend night after night sitting in my room and listening to the obvious stations such as BBC Radio 1 and Radio Luxembourg. One night by chance I accidently switched my receiver to short wave, and as a consequence of this, put The Clash, Devo and The Jam on hold for a little while as I became engrossed in the many strange sounds I discovered.

I became obsessed with listening to the propaganda broadcasts from Radio Moscow, it opened my ears to what I imagined (probably correctly?) as a dark and sinister world. Who else was listening? I remember one instance during the miners strike in the early 80’s when Radio Moscow constantly reported the ‘fact’ that despite a shortage of coal miners in the USSR productivity was nevertheless booming. It was fascinating, it was such an obvious agenda, surely no one, even me a western imperialist (as we all were according to Moscow!), could ever fall for such blatant propaganda.  Despite the fact that through the eyes of the Kremlin I was just another capitalist landowner (another popular phrase they used) The Voice of America just made me laugh even more. Not nearly as scary but even more blindingly obvious with its propaganda, which of course was the polar opposite to what was being reported and broadcasted by Radio Moscow.

I also discovered stations playing just Morse Code signals and those strange gongs which apparently derived from Stasi run radio stations in East Germany. On several occasions I stumbled across numbers stations, coded messages sent in the sideband of normal short wave programmes. How I managed this I’m still not sure, maybe the weather had something to do with it, or maybe I just struck lucky. I remember sitting in my room listening to the robotic listing of apparently random numbers and wondering what it was all about, who these broadcasts were meant for and whether I was perhaps listening to a message of great political and military importance. But let’s face the fact that if some kid in the home counties was able to listen to these messages then obviously those who understood the significance of such broadcasts would also be listening too.

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Air Traffic Control communications recorded between 8.20pm and 9pm (GMT) on Friday 23^rd October 2009.

This madness is an excerpt of a small part of a project I’m working on at the moment.

Air Traffic Control at –

EHAM Amsterdam - The Netherlands

EPWA Warsaw - Poland

LGAV Athens - Greece

LKPR Prague - Czech Republic

KBOS Boston (Tower) - USA

KHOU Houston - USA

JFK New York (Delivery) - USA

KJFK New York (Departure) - USA

VHHH Hong Kong Intl. - Hong Kong, China

SABE Buenos Aires - Argentina

SBBR Brasília - Brazil

TTPP Trinidad and Tobago - Trinidad

YSSY Sydney - Australia

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I’ve just witnessed the most pefect rainbow ever…and I didn’t have my camera…but nevertheless I’m happy to have seen it.

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Probably the most annoying Buskers in the world…ever…they’d been repeating this phrase, from an Abba favourite, for at least 15 minutes before I went and recorded them from the street…now just imagine trying to work with this constantly in the background…

Never mind, another beautiful sunset to enjoy when I got home…

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Sometimes you really have to search in order to find sounds that are unique to any one place, geographical sonic signatures. It seems that every city looks and sounds very similar now, which is, of course, very sad.

The bustling city of Seoul is one of the worlds largest cities and with that comes traffic, lots of traffic. The one thing that’s most notable is the lack of Police car sirens, I didn’t hear one whilst I was there. I have to say that I felt the safest I’ve ever felt, whilst exploring any city in the world, and I wonder how much of this was due to the lack of this one sound. I was never aware of any crime or, the possibility that there was likely to be any.

It appears that Seoul is sadly losing its identity very quickly, every other shop seems to be a Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts or, Krispy Kreme (my downfall). It sadly feels far more western than Asian, a clone of any large city in the USA. It does still have a unique identity but you really have to search for this as it is quickly getting buried (and hidden away) under a vast array of American corporate identities.  

This recording was taken at 7am, on Saturday 19^th September 2009, from my 12^th floor hotel room at the Lexington Hotel in the heart of Seoul’s financial district.

Could this be any city in the world? What makes it uniquely Seoul? I sadly don’t know.

Latitude 37°32′14.15″N

Longitude 127° 3′18.07″E

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Lots of voices, a busy Street outside the Daehango Arts Theatre, Seoul.

8pm, 18th September 2009.

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The Great Hero Hall, Seoul, so called because it enshrines the Shakyamuni Buddha whose teachings are fundamental to The Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism.

This hall is designated as Seoul City Cultural Treasure No. 127 and is the single largest floor hall in Korea.

This was recorded outside this amazing building.

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A courtyard in the beautiful Changdeokgung Palace, Seoul. Cicadas, Birds, tourists. This place could well be a sonic heaven without the infiltration of Seouls heavy traffic in the background. Oh well.

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