Sounds from the edges of culture and between the cracks of category

COVID 19 - Just a note to say that during this crisis physical releases are being posted as normal, the postbox is on my exercise route!

Latest Releases- 
​Cassette Imprint

LOR150 - Found Drowned
​-Clownslave

For the 20th release in Linear Obsessional's cassette imprint we are proud to present the new album by the extraordinary improvising trio Found Drowned.
All members of the group have recorded separately for LinOb in the past, but this trio recording sees them at the height of their powers.
Found Drowned are the improvising trio of James O’Sullivan, Peter Marsh and Paul May. The three first played together around a decade ago and released their eponymous first album back in 2012; since then they’ve occasionally popped up at the usual improv hotspots, collaborating with the likes of New Zealand violinist Chris Prosser or Danish saxophonist Julie Kjaer among others.
"Clownslave" is an extended improvisation featuring the unique sounds of O'Sullivan's Telecaster, alongside the well placed bass swoops and slides of Pater Marsh and the mercurial percussion of Paul May.  
Available on cassette and download now

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LOR148 - Matt Warren
-Ghost (of) Trains/Train of Ghosts

Matt Warren, based in Hobart, Tasmania as an artist with a practice that has a basis in both composition and improvisation. His work investigates memory, transcendence, liminal spaces and suspension of disbelief.
"Ghosts (of) Trains" is an investigative piece of psychacoustics, field recordings and test-tones. Unnerving, baffling and hypnotic by turns.
"My town no longer has any trains that travel through it, the tracks are disused, they are rusty and weeds grow amongst them. The whistles, the crossing bells and the clattering of the train wheels were once a part of the soundscape of my town. As a child, I was once told that you could tell a train was coming, even a long way off, by touching the track and feeling the vibration. Using a pair of simple, home-made contact mics, and bookending each exploration with a tone, I searched for evidence of past journeys...."
​Matt Warren from PDF notes.
To purchase please visit the release page

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LOR143 - Steven Ball
-All Living Can Anyone Be Here

A new collection of experimental songs from Steven Ball (his fourth for Linear Obsessional) - singular, timely and full of the peculiar observational ambience that Ball has made his own.
All Living Can Anyone Be Here contains four songs and one instrumental. All but one of the songs were written and recorded during April and May 2020, two of those ('Even on a Wednesday' and 'Private Ambulance') reflect the coronavirus situation of that period, concentrating in particular on the attendant shifts in the subjective experience of space and time. The album’s title track is more an abstracted meditation on what might more broadly be called 'the state of society’, a bewilderment of news reports and the author’s own observations. 'And on the Heath', was written and recorded before the crisis, and considers spatial and temporal dislocation in attempting to evoke the place known as Blackheath in South East London as a 'landscape', wherein the song's narrator is resigned to admit that "...we can’t observe the boundless heath, all we do is point to things".
​To stream or purchase please visit the release page

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LOR142 - Charlotte Law
​-Ice Since Fire

Linear Obsessional is very excited to release the debut album by London based guitarist, sound artist and multi discipline performer Charlotte Law.  Charlotte plays mesmerising live concerts using a table-top prepared electric guitar producing scintilating sounds and tones as she balances objects on the strings and bows the instrument with an extraordinary level of control. She also incorporates text into her performances and has worked with film.
​Released on cassette and download.
To stream or purchase please visit the release page

LOR 138 - Solaris
​-Findings and Soundings

The long awaited follow up to their debut on Linear Obsessional (itself, arguably some 45 years in the making!) "Findings and Soundings" was recorded by Mark Spybey in the coastal town of Redcar, in the North East of England, where the three members of the band first met as children in the early 70s. Mark Spybey (later to work as Dead Voices on Air), Richard Sanderson (later to found Linear Obsessional Recordings) and his cousin Mark Sanderson first started playing together in 1974 as (just) teenagers - "Findings and Soundings" sees the band aproaching their 60s.
This album continues to work in their late syle - a mix of free improvisation (in fact all the music is improvised), a psychedelic electronic influence, and, undoubtedly, the sound sometimes labelled "spacerock" which was the sound that brought them together in the first place. Playful, explorative and economical "Findings and Soundings" is the triumphant return of the North East's longest running experimental band.
Released as a limited edition cassette and download.
To purchase or stream please visit the release page

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Forthcoming Releases

LOR146 - Daniel Figgis
​-THE TIN GOD

 A new release by the Irish composer, musician and one time Virgin Prune Daniel Figgis. "Thinning" is a conceptual piece on the theme of absence. Composed, recorded and erased by Daniel Figgis, 2020.
To be released as alimited edition audio cassette and download.

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Latest Releases -
​Downloads

LOR152 - Matt Atkins
-Two Keralan Scenes

Sound artist and improvising musician Matt Atkins provides us with our fifth installment of the Linear Obsessional Single Series (single length releases, A and B sides, no music)
"Two Keralan Scenes" was recorded in India in January 2020.
Released as a download at classic single price (75p) with front and back covers.
To listen or purchase please visit the release page

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LOR151 - Cravune
-Parc de la Ciutadella

​The fourth release in the Linear Obsessional singls series (two tracks, 7" single length, A and B sides, no music), the Naples born, Berlin based sound artist Cravune presents two recordings made in the eponymous park in Barcelona, Spain.
"The first track is an unusual way of singing (at least to me at that time) of birds. On the second track you can hear my steps on dry leaves as I go back home passing by the Cascada fountain. On that specific day I was in the park of Ciutadella to meditate and relax but also to collect material to be included in the soundscape for a contemporary dance project of a friend - hence the birds... but we ended up not using much of that crazy shrieking :) "
-Cravune
To stream or download please visit the release page

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LOR149 - Chris Whitehead
​-Vent

The third in the Linear Obsessional Single Series - 7" length download tracks, A and B sides, no music.

"Modern ventilators are designed to take over the breathing functions of patients in order for surgical procedures to be carried out or in those that cannot adequately breathe for themselves due to disease.
They have automated self-test sequences which check their various mechanical and electronic systems are fully functional.
Vent 1 is a recording of part of the test sequence of an anaesthetic ventilator typically used during surgical operations.
Vent 2 documents the full test sequence of a portable ventilator used for transferring patients from one area to another within the same hospital or during ambulance transfers to other hospitals."
-Chris Whitehead
To stream or download please visit the release page

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LOR147 - Lou Barnell
​-Bicycle Recordings

The second release in Linear Obsessional's download single series is by the sound and performance artist Lou Barnell.

"I have been cycling around cities for most of my life.
When you decide to record bicycles suddenly they are everywhere- hurtling and bumping along the banks of Glen Faba, a swimming hole in Essex, or blasting along the gravelly underbelly of a tunnel amidst the tense traffic noise of the Olympic park in East London."
To purchase or stream please go to the release page

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LOR139 - Duncan Chapman
​- Transporter

Linear Obsessional announces a new series curated by David Little and Richard Sanderson, with Duncan Chapman's "Transporter", Download singles (two tracks; A and B sides, each around three minutes or under)  of field recordings. Rather than the longform field recordings usually end up being, the Lin Ob singles will be perfectly crystalised moments outside your normal daily experience. At the time of writing, the whole world is in Covid 19 lockdown, so these audio bulletins from the outside world are even more pertinent.
"Transporter" consists of two recordings made at the famous Transporter Bridge, the skyline dominating symbol of Miiddlesbrough. Side A is a walk across the top as the mechanism of the gondola move across the River Tees, Side B is the sound of the Winding House as it pulls the Gondola full of cars and people across the river. An audio slice of 19th Century technology.
​available for classic single price of 75p. 
To download please visit the release page

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LOR141 - Cyff Gwawd
-We Love To Wash Our Hands

"In 2011 I had a thought: What if a minimalist composer, like Reich, Glass, or Riley, wrote children's songs about things like washing your hands? The kids would wash their hands all day! Fast forward to 2020, and we're ALL washing our hands all day."
                                                                    -Alex Sramek
Cyff Gwawd is Stuart Estell, a piano, and a barely-functional cassette recorder.
This album consists of versions of Alex Sramek’s piece “We love to wash our hands”, played considerably more slowly than Alex’s own performances. When transferring the recording to the computer, the cassette motor decided to play back only at high speed, so the Bb version is actually as it came out of the cassette player, overlaid multiple times. The raw track was then processed to bring it back to original pitch, and a “field recording” (recorded digitally!) of ambient lockdown sounds, recorded from our kitchen window in Redditch on a sunny spring afternoon, was added. The third and final track takes the field recording and adds a drone created by processing low piano notes.
To purchase or stream please visit the release page

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LOR140 - Various Artists
​>>>>>Self Isolating Congregation<<<<<

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Twenty New Quartets and One Trio.
After releasing the >>>>>Self Isolating Compilation<<<<< of 85 tracks of solo music performed under lockdown, I invited 21 artists to mix tracks together to create new musical units. To avoid any bias every artist was alotted their tracks via the use of a random number generator. Once given the tracks the artists could do what they wanted with them, as long as elements from all the tracks were present.
The result is a fascinating collection of virtual ensembles, in which every track from the original compilation re-appears, often in a miraculously mutated fashion.
​To view listen and download please visit the release page.

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LOR136 - Various Artists
->>>>>Self Isolating Compilation<<<<<

These 85 (Eighty Five!) tracks are an attempted answer to the conundrum - how do we make social music when we're all isolated. All the tracks were recorded in isolation at home, and almost all solo . There are tracks from UK, USA, France, Spain, Finland, Sweden, Ireland and the Canary Islands. The result is a kaleidoscope of variety - electronics, acoustic improvisations, the odd song and a poem.
This may feel like 85 individuals shouting into the maelstrom, or whistling in the dark, but it's really the sounds of people coming to terms with the isolation and being creative, and it is remarkably cohesive.
Volume Two ">>>>>Self Isolatating Congregation<<<<<" will bring the musicians together in quartets and trios mixed by Linear Obsessional artists.
To stream or download please visit the release page

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Forthcoming Releases