A new Henrik Meierkord release is always welcome. He has mastered the technologically mediated cello, striving for and achieving a steady, layered tonality that underlines the moment without overwhelming it. “Drones with my beloved cello and pedal” is his simple description of this new set, When time becomes a loop, yet from such a simple combination vast spaces and rich harmonies are made. Overdubbing and reverb and granular effects have become common elements in music-making, but it still takes a considered approach to sustain such a thing, and all the more so to explore new aspects of ambient textures. Meierkord, as always, delivers.
There’s a grain silo in Scotland I’ve been reading about for years (thecourier.co.uk, thetimes.com). In the town of Cupar in the parish of Fife, the silo originated as part of a former sugar beet processing factory. That factory, now defunct, would turn 100 this coming year. The silo is of more recent vintage, dating from 1964. In 2025, the silo — the Cupar Grain Silo, as it’s called — launched a series of live recordings, making the most of the venue’s expansive resonance. The second release is a nearly 45-minute live set by the musician Konx-om-Pax. It’s mastered by Russell Haswell, who contributed the first release in this new series. Spacious and rangy, slow-moving yet making occasionally drastic shifts in instrumentation (rich drones, echoing near silence, thick choral singing), it’s something to put on, turn up, and give one’s own room over to.
Here’s footage, from several years back, of what I believe to be musician Scott Gordon performing in the silo:
And here’s some drone footage of the outside of the silo:
On Sundays I try to at least quickly note some of my favorite listening from the week prior — things I would later regret having not written about in more depth, so better to share here briefly than not at all.
▰ There’s a gorgeous collection, six sound installations, of installation soundtracks — all looping, gestural, atmospheric audio — by the late Steve Roden (1964-2023) out on the Line label. The exhibits where these works were first installed were at such places as the Miami Museum of Contemporary Art, UCLA Hammer Museum, e/static gallery (Torino, Italy), and Henry Museum (Seattle, WA), as well as at the Mercosur Biennial (Porto Allegre, Brazil), among others. Roden was a master of — and originator of — lowercase sound. Fittingly, the album, which is 3.5 hours long, includes the instruction “play at low volume.”
Steve’s friend, sometime collaborator, and now archivist, Stephen Vitiello, wrote an essay about the ongoing archival process of Roden’s audio work for thekitchen.org.
▰ Infinity Gradient is an hour-long collaboration between composer Tristan Perich and organist James McVinnie, in which McVinnie’s instrument intertwines with 100 speakers playing sounds resulting from the Perich’s fascination with low-fidelity 1-bit audio. The music is a symphony of precious — sometimes vibrant, sometimes fragile — minimalism.
At the end of each week, I usually collate a lightly edited collection of recent comments I’ve made on social media, which I think of as my public scratch pad. I find knowing I’ll revisit my posts to be a positive and mellowing influence on my social media activity. I mostly hang out on Mastodon (at post.lurk.org/@disquiet), and I’m also trying out a few others. And I generally take weekends off social media.
▰ I need to hack my TV to include serial commas in captions
▰ Sitting here in the mall by myself with my earbuds in noise cancellation mode, listening to abstract music, I can tell you that just about any track of abstract music would work as a music video if you just set up a camera in a mall and let the world saunter by. It’s like a minimalist-budget Koyaanisqatsi.
▰ My video playlist on YouTube of live performances of ambient music is up to 225 tracks. It is, apparently, 31 hours, 48 minutes, and 1 second in length. (Tracks come and go. I rarely if ever delete them from the playlist, but sometimes they do get removed from the overall service.)
▰ That’s pretty cool. I didn’t realize that the Spanish edition of my 33 1/3 book on Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works Volume II was the first book in the series of Spanish translations. Some background on the publisher here (in Spanish).
▰ Have a good weekend. Open a window as soon as you wake up. Search an ebook of your favorite novel from childhood for the words “sound” and “listen” and note the results. Play an album very loud from the next room over. See you Tuesday — or maybe Wednesday.
Got a good photo of Autechre’s awesome show at the Regency here in San Francisco:
Bonus points to the musician — FiLTHMiLK, I was informed by Wobbly — who set up across the street from the Autechre concert at the Regency and drew a crowd when the show ended, around 11:15pm.
Oh, and in case the joke up top didn’t register, here is what was projected on the screen in advance of Autechre taking the stage:
