Speechification

David Quantick is the perfect chap to do this celebration of Mix Tape culture. I suspect the speechification audience doesn’t need to be told of the joy of mixtaping, this is right up our collective street, but it’s still a splendidly evocative listen. Of course, with the advent of Muxtape et al, there might be a programme soon about the Reappearing Art Of The Mix Tape. Though it won’t be quite the same without the biro scrawling. MP3 here.

Next up in our mini-series of London Ear interviews from Resonance.fm is Mr Green Gartside of Scritti Politti. Interviewing courtesy of Mr Ben Thompson. Things we hear include a Scritti Politti song about getting a train to Wimbledon, how Mr Gartside is unencumbered by associative reminiscence, how Derrida tried to steal his girlfriend and Fixing A Hole by The Beatles. The sound quality isn’t brilliant. Not sure why. Sorry. MP3 here.

Been busy. Sorry. Listen to this, it’s brilliant. MP3 here.

Here’s something first broadcast on Resonance FM - a history of electronic music around the world, made by Ian Helliwell and Simon James. It’s broadcast every Friday evening at 7.30 on Resonance. Or you can get a podcast via Simon’s blog. There are more links at Music Thing and the mp3 is here. Lovely stuff.

Steve has raved about Chris Watson before. Maybe a couple of time actually. So I suspect he’s going to be a speechification staple, his recordings are just brilliant. And the way he layers them together, edits and moulds them. I know it’s a cliche, but it makes you listen to the world properly again. What’s extra special about this programme is also hearing from Mr Watson himself, explaining what excites him about this stuff. MP3 here.

I was just thinking how I’d love to hear this sensibility applied to the city when I noticed on Mr Watson’s website, that he’s leading a ‘Field Recording in the City’ workshop at the Museum of Garden History on January 28th. Must go to that.

I’m putting this up quick because I reckon the five (five already!) Speechification contributors will be racing to do so. Since the rest of them probably have better things to do with their Saturday nights, I’m first! It’s another Archive Hour (I love the Archive Hour).

This one celebrates found and accidental and informal and amateur recordings collected by American independent media celebrities the ‘Kitchen Sisters’, Nikki Silva and Davia Nelson, for broadcast on their NPR radio show Lost and Found Sound.

If Russell’s last selection was Speechification crack, then this one must be Speechification cocoa. It’s full of breathtaking recordings from sources you won’t believe: 9/11 voicemail messages, a Buster Keaton sing-along, Tennessee Williams mucking around with his friends, a man who actually heard the Gettysburg Address… Moving and joyful stuff. (MP3).

And another thing: why don’t they just turn Saturday Live into a British Lost and Found Sound?

Retro-technology + music geekery = speechification crack. And that’s what this programme is; “a radio celebration of quarter-inch magnetic tape - an invention that revolutionised the whole world of recorded sound”. I can’t find any reference to it anywhere on the BBCternets but it’s full of names that will excite audio enthusiasts: Paddy Kingsland. Geoff Emerick. Ron Geesin. Piers Plowright. Brilliant programme. I also enjoyed knowing that it took 2,100 feet and 7 inches of tape to make. (MP3 here)

Here’s another very Radio 4 thing, an “adventure in sound and memory” from 2004. The only reference I can find to it anywhere is this page from radiolistings.co.uk which appears to be another volunteer project, providing archive listings for speech radio. The sounds here “the ring of an old telephone, a treadle sewing machine, the hum of a radiogram” are splendidly evocative, even if I don’t share the actual nostalgia of the contributors. And I suspect it won’t be long before I’m tempted to make a similar programme about the noise of a modem handshaking or the painful banging ring of one of those rock-hard shrunken footballs hitting a cold thigh in a 70s playground. (MP3 here)