A collection of things from 2006, released here under my 'Pronto Porto' tier. Acoustic instrumentals, sometimes straight, sometimes abstract, both wild and soothing. Drums and percussion, berimbau, field recordings, acoustic bass, guitars, harmonium, balafon, violin, clapping and shouting in stairwells, scraping and bowing and a lot more to tickle your ears.

Blindfold Dancer (12th March) - From ‘Out’, a compilation by modern guitarists, in tribute to Derek Bailey who died on Christmas Day 2005. Acoustic guitar in an open tuning played with a vaquita, the stick used to play a berimbau; shouts and claps in the concrete stairwell with Melanie outside our flat, bass guitar, effected glockenspiels and bowed and scraped acoustic guitars.. The tune was inspired by the album Derek Bailey made with dancer Min Tanaka where halfway through rain begins falling on the metal roof above. Ross Parfitt (A Buffalo Crossing/The Heartfelt Four) had played me this record a few years before, so I was working inspired by a memory. I came across the record at a hifi convention later in the summer (I was there with work) and bought a copy of my own.

Balafon (15th April) - I got a balafon for my 30th birthday, but as a long-time vegetarian I couldn’t really deal with the obviously animal parts (gut and hide), so this is the one thing I recorded with it before I took it back.

The Accordianist’s tale (30th May) - Made for an online competition where you had to tell the story of three photos via music. I wrote it on the bontempi organ I’d had as a kid, adding sounds from the Amsterdam collage, acoustic bass and guitar.

New Live Maybe (25th June) - I finally got a (late 60s Premier) bass drum and then some cymbals and stands to complete the drum kit I’d been putting together the last couple of years. The bass is the acoustic again, and the ‘guitar’ is the same bass pitched up and run through an amp (you can hear it in the original pitch at the end when I'm answering the intercom). I was imaging the idea of a band again, and I’d try that the following year. Bowed acoustic bass guitars, glockenspiel.

Bass Theme (26th July) - I liked themes and playing them on different instruments and in different ways. More bowed acoustic bass, and mic’ing the bass for the finger and fretboard sounds.

Guitar Idea 71bpm (11th September)

Attracted to the Flame that Kills You (22nd September) - My violinist friend Fiona Stewart was in the UK again, having moved to Budapest the year before. She came over and we played around with a couple of themes, throwing in everything we had and then bringing instruments in and out of the mix until it kind of made of sense.

Eat Your Heart Out (15th October) - For another compilation by the same group of guitarists as ‘Blindfold Dancer’. Mostly nylon string guitars, bowed mandolins and rhythms on the gourde of the berimbau.


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