Storm Bugs - Storm Bugs

 

Side A

1 Untitled

2 Our Main Objective

3 Blackheath Incident

 

Side B

1 Hiemal/Window Shopping

2 Outburst

3 Hodge

All tracks and music by Philip Sanderson except Untitled which features Sarah Pomeroy on Cello. 

Credits:

Format: Cassette, 5-10 copies

Release Date: 1981

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: SS1

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson. Photocopy onto white card. Photograph taken by David Scholefield in Maidstone

 

Notes:

A compilation of tracks By Storm Bugs many of which had been previously released. The Hiemal/Window Shopping track is a unique mix and was used as the soundtrack to the Storm Bugs film Table Matters by Steven Ball. This was re-issued on the 40th anniversary CD of a A Safe Substitute. Similarly the mix of Our Main Objective differs from other versions.  

Philip Sanderson - Lay-by Lullaby

Lay-by Lullaby 6.48

Credits:

Format: CD-R, 25 copies

Release Date: 2020

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: TCH 214

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson

 

Notes:

A one track CD-R, an unashamed homage to the boys from Dusseldorf. Later re-issued on the Passionate Particles CD.

Claire Thomas and Susan Vezey - Reprint

Side One

Bright waves

Reprint 1

 

Side Two

Reprint 2

Under Press of Sail

Nein Nein Nein

 

All tracks by Philip Sanderson, except 'Nein NeinNein' by Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball, 'Bright Waves' by Philip Sanderson & Nancy Slessinger.

 

Credits:

Format: Cassette 100 copies

Release Date: 1980

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: Fuse TCH 220

Sleeve Design: Steven Ball. Photocopy onto blue card,

 

Notes:

Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey fist appeared on Snatch 1 in 1979, and were a pseudonym for Philip Sanderson. Quite where the idea came from for a female alter ego I can't recall - possibly a nod to Ducahmp's Rrose SÈlavy? To accompany Reprint a press release was issued which cast the pair as a Pre-Raethelite synthesizer duo with robes flowing as they strode across Blackheath. It was intended that the whole thing be a fairly transparent spoof. A small display board with a number of Snatch Tapes cases on it was put up in Rough Trade shop in 1980 and was seen by an A & R man from Cherry Red who believing in the existence of the pair included the Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey track 'Bright Waves' on the compilation LP Perspectives & Distortion. Cherry Red were even intending to put out an LP by the duo untik their cover was blown.

 

The sleeve notes on the tape sleeve are somewhat inaccurate,There are in fact four tracks on Reprint. The first track 'Bright Waves' features some tape delayed ethereal vocals (supplied by Nancy Slessinger) whilst the two longer tracks employ a VCS3 and tape delay process to produce an evolving percussive landscape. The fourth track is the old favourite 'Under Press of Sail' from Snatch 1. A few copies of the tape included a fifth track; a ring modulator cassette tape loop piece by Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball entitled 'Nein Nein Nein'. For info on the CD re-issue go to Reprint CD

 

Review:

From: the Wire Magazine by Jim Haynes:

 

Part shrewd marketing manoeuvre, part homage to Marcel Duchamp's alter ego Rose Selavy, DIY electronic pioneer Philip Sanderson donned the personna of Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey as two female electronic minimalists in the late 70's and early 80's. He kept up the charade long enough to land a Thomas & Vezey track on the 1980 Cherry Red compilation Perspectives and Distortion but was thwarted in his attempts to when the label discovered that Claire & Susan were not who they claimed to be. Sanderson subsequently released those recordings as the Reprint Cassette through his Snatch Tapes [actually the cassette release came first and was what lead Cherry Red to discover Thomas and Vezey], which published his other project Storm Bugs and a couple of recordings from the then unknown composer David Jackman. 23 years later the electronic din of Claire & Susan resurfaces, although the author is no longer hiding behind the pseudonym. Fortunately the music of Reprint (Anomalous NOM23) is much more than a giddy prank. Aptly described by Sanderson as 'an inverted Pop Art aesthetic', Reprint graft a grimy brutism culled from home made ring modulators and dismembered answering machines onto the sterile arepeggiations and polyrhythmic interplay of Cluster or Chris Carter's early productions. what may have been consigned to the dustbin of 1980's cassette culture turns out to be a marvellous find, as good as any of the recently recovered cassettes of recordings of Cabaret Voltaire or Throbbing Gristle."

 

Various - Snatch 1

Side 1

Karl's Empty Body - 1441

N4's - N4's

Storm Bugs - Hodge

 

Side 2

Steven Reynolds

Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey - Under Press of Sail

A Clough - Untitled

Credits:

Format: Cassette, 50 copies

Release Date: 1979

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: None

Sleeve Design: Photocopy onto white paper, design by Philip Sanderson, photo by Sally Francis

 

Notes:

The first ever Snatch Tape kicks off with the DIY pop of Karl's Empty Body, a fairly straightforward number, nicely mangled by being fed through a couple of VCS3 ring modulators. The N4's feature some sweet blister guitar (Neu with a drum machine?). Side one rounds off with the Storm Bugs number 'Hodge' again featuring that great British synth the VCS3. Side 2 has the first outing for those fictitous knob twiddlers Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey. The side ends with a melancholic piece of morse interference by A Clough. The tracks by Karl's Empty Body, The N4s, A Clough, and Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey were all later included on the Vinyl on Demand LP Snatch Paste.

Various - Cassette Culture - Homemade Music and the Creative Spirit in the Pre-Internet-Age

CD1

10-Speed Guillotine - Temper Tango 

Aconite (2) -The Truth About Cable TV 

Another Headache - Cacophony Continues 

Autopsia - Lebensherrgabe 

Beequeen - EE EA 

Big City Orchestra - Karawane 

Bret Hart - Partytime 

Brume - An Amphibian 

Cacophony 33 - Frank 

Charles Rice Goff III - Big Surprise 

Dog As Master - Black Body (Excerpt) 

Don Campau - 'I Am Not Satisfied 

E Coli - Lag Phase / Djihad 

E G Oblique Graph - Fall Into Glass 

F-i - Zombie 

Gen Ken Montgomery - It Happened To You 

Girls On Fire - In My Blood 

If,Bwana - Beauty And The Beast 

ITN / Mental Anguish - Frce Of Waves (Edit) 

Jeff Central - Tragick 

Joseph K Noyce - The Beat 

Kapotte Muziek - Audio Plagio 2 

Ken Moore - Soft Pretense 

  

CD2

Larynx - Graett 

Lord Litter - St James Infirmary 

Markus Schwill - The Advantage Of Tape-Music 

Minoy - Eskalith 

Monochrome Bleu - Imagination 

Muslimgauze - Cyst 

Mystery Hearsay - Painted 

Non Toxique - Lost Statements 

PBK - Untitled 04 

Philip Johnson - Two Tracks Unused At The Time 

Psi Nukli - Trip Sequence II 

R Stevie Moore - Puttin' Up The Groceries 

Ri Gillham - Soundtracks For Imaginary Films 

Rimbaud Brothers - Deceit 

Rod Summers - Sad News 

Sheer Zed - Take A Walk Down The Street 

Storm Bugs - Hodge 

Taste Of Stool - Squeeze Bees 

Viktimized Karcass - 3.32 AM Rain 

Vittore Baroni - Living With Prosthesis 

Walls Of Genius - Sunday, Monday Or Always! 

Wolfgang Wiggers - I'll Cry Tomorrow 

2-23 -Years On Earth -Opposition

 

Credits:

Format: 320 page book by Jerry Kranitz with 2 x CD

Release Date: 2020

Label: Vinyl on Demand

Catalogue Number: VOD158

Sleeve Design: Jelle Martensn

 

Notes:

A book on cassette culture with accompanying 2 x CD set. Includes the Storm Bugs track 'Hodge'.

Various - Perspectives and Distortion

Side A

Claire Thomas and Susan Vezey - Bright Waves

Matt Johnson - What Stanley Saw

Virgin Prunes - "Third Secret"

Lol Coxhill - The Calm...

Lemon Kittens - ...In Wooden Brackets

Eyeless In Gaza - You Frighten

Kevin Coyne - Hello Judas

Mark Perry - Dear, Dear

Side B

Ben Watt - Departure

Two Daughters - Return Call/We Are

Kevin Hampson - People In Space

Thomas Leer - Kings of Sham

Five or Six - Folded

Morgan-Fisher - Foreign Correspondent

Robert Fripp - Remorse of Conscience

A Tent - No Way of Knowing

David Jackman - Untitled

Credits:

Format: LP

Release Date: 1981

Label: Cherry Red Records

Catalogue Number BRED15:

 

Format: CD

Release Date: 2003

Label: Cherry Red Records

Catalogue Number: CDMRED231.

 

Notes:

A Cherry Red compilation from 1981 featuring Claire Thomas & Susan Vezey's Bright Waves (a different version of the track that appears on the Reprint cassette) and 'Untitled' by David Jackman. The LP was Re-issued in 2003 on CD on Cherry Red's archive series. The Claire Thomas and Susan Vezey 'Bright Waves' track was also re-issued on the On One of These Bends LP by Philip Sanderson in 2018. 

 

David Jackman - Up from Zero

Tracklist:

Ways To The Sea 

Threshold 

Up From Zero

Offshore

 

Credits:

Format,: CD 500 copies

Release Date: 2003

Label: Robot Records 

Catalogue Number: RR-31

Sleeve and label Design: David Jackman

 

Notes:

Up From Zero was originally released in 1982 on cassette (Aeroplane Records AR3, UK), This CD re-issue also includes 'Offshore' (1980) a collaboration with Philip Sanderson which first appeared on the David Jackman Snatch Tape, Ritual (TCH211). The cover shows David from sometime in 1979/80.

  

Storm Bugs - Supplementary Benefit

Side A 

1 Cash Wash 1:41

2 Eat Good Beans 1:59

3 Make Customers Matter 2:09

4 Window Shopping 2:06

5 Our Main Objective 4:44

6 Car Situations 3:20

7 Tin 2:54

8 Aboulia 19 1:06

Side B

1 Hodge 6:41

2 Slip Slap 1:36

3 Hiemal (And She Blew) 4:51

4 He Rose Up Again 3:08

5 Slow Along the Wire 1:24

6 Blackheath Episode 4:44

 

Tracks A1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, B1, 3, 4, 5, 6 by Philip Sanderson. Tracks A6, 7, B2 by Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball.

 

Credits:

Format: LP, 500 numbered copies

Release Date: 2007

Label: Vinyl on Demand 

Catalogue Number: VOD44

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball. Photography by Steven Ball

 

Notes:

Side A of the LP comprises full length versions of the the first two Storm Bugs singles; namely the Table Matters EP (1980) and the Metamorphose single (1981). Side B contains tracks made with the unique british synthesizer the VCS3. The VCS3 has a matrix pin patch bay in which any module can be connected to any other module, resulting in complex feedback loops and unexpected modulations. The VCS3 tracks are all taken from original Snatch Tapes cassette releases.

 

Review:

Review by Ed Pinsent from: the Sound Projector magazine - 16th Issue.

An extremely satisfying and coherent spin, this excellent LP compiles some of the finest Storm Bugs work released on vinyl and cassette during 1978- 1981. Some of the cuts have appeared on that previous CD compilation Let's Go Outside and Get it Over, but this LP scoops the prize for being more comprehensive and complete, and laying out the songs in a meaningful order. It also follows a schema of sorts ñ side B contains all electronic music, side A represents the 'clunky bedroom' side of the duo, Philip Sanderson and Steven Ball.

 

The 'Table Matters' EP was released on vinyl by Loop Records in 1980; it's five tracks of edgy, clattering mayhem, made with a combination of electronics, radios, guitars, tape loops, percussion and much more. Effectively a Sanderson solo set, this EP displays wild and rugged invention compressed into short bursts of electrifying genius; four of the cuts are only two minutes apiece. Using found spoken word tapes and warped voicings, Storm Bugs deliver something that is not so much a critique of consumerism, as a semi-nightmarish distorted view of shopping in England in 1980, replete with Kwik-Save signs, shoddy goods, and futile attempts to keep customers happy. ëTable Mattersí is almost their Santa Dog; it's a perfect cryptic statement, almost inexhaustible in content, transpires in less than 15 minutes and leaves you feeling troubled for days. Great!

 

We also got both sides of the 'Car Situations' single, of which the flipside 'Tin' is something Sanderson refers to as pseudo-rockabilly using a percussion loop arrived at by very devious means. Yet 'Tin' is as catchy a pop tune as they ever recorded, with some delightful guitar riffing from Ball.

 

Side 2 of the LP features six examples of their work with the VCS3 synth, the Sythi-Bug, and short-wave radio; these are rescued from cassettes released on Sanderson's Snatch Tapes label, including Dark Cuttings, Gift, Storm Bugs and A Safe Substitute. Generally longer than the 'poppy' material on the first side, these extremely strange instrumentals give the impression of something infinite and endless, cautious explorations made across foggy and unknown territories. Both 'Hodge' and 'Blackheath Episode' are exceptionally strong experiments in electronic music, but by the time you're stranded in the middle of 'He Rose Up Again', you will be feeling almost dizzy with the doubt, fear and sheer bewilderment that seems to be embedded in every minute of this music. Ball's abstract scrapy guitar work on 'Hiemal (And She Blew)' is most notable, and it's a shame there aren't more examples of that metallic guitar noise combined so effectively with the VCS3 work; it's one of those rare moments when the separate contributions of the Bugs are fused together perfectly. Sanderson's edgier guitar work is demonstrated on 'Slow Along the Wire', a 90-second miniature of trembling angst.

 

File this alongside the estimable Snatch Paste compilation LP and we have an emerging picture of the Storm Bugs / Snatch Tapes aesthetic. There may not be much of this material available, but Sanderson and Ball are to be commended for the very inventive ways in which they explored their ideas, and they have rendered unique visions of the psychic underside of England, visions as palpable as the monochromatic photograph (by Ball) on the back cover which celebrates the horrors of suburbia with an enquiring eye. credits

 

Philip Sanderson - Through a Telephone Box Darkly/Suicide Suite

1 Intro (The Boy in the Bright Blue Jeans) (0:41) 

2 Golden Showers (January 72)  (3:35) 

3 Cortege (3:09) 

4 Heartache in Heddon St ( 5:46) 

5 Scene Change  (1:13) 

6 Through a Telephone Box Darkly (5:10) 

7 Weird & Gilly Ride Again (4:22) 

All tracks by Philip Sanderson

 

Credits:

Format: CD-R, 50 copies

Release Date: 2000

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: tch

Sleeve Design: Layout by Philip Sanderson

 

Notes:

Suicide Suite is a collection of tracks built around snippets (or as they were described in a press release at the time "fag ends and fade-outs") from Bowie's much-celebrated Ziggy Stardust LP. The result is less mash-up, and more of a soundtrack to Heddon street the location for the red telephone box seen on the back of the LP. 50 promotional CD-R were produced with a view to securing an official release. Bowie's office in New York were contacted and agreed in principle as long as there was a minimum of 10,000 copies of the CD made. This was financially unfeasible at the time and so the please did not go ahead, which perhaps was the intention? Whether Bowie ever got to hear the tracks we shall never know.

 

The Bowie fan site 5 Years ran a small feature on the release in early 2001, and the majority of the CD-Rs went to keen Bowie fans. Since then the tracks have popped up on the web a couple of times in a slightly expanded version with extra tracks retitled as Through A Telephone Box Darkly. The notes below are from the 5 Years feature.

 

1 Intro (The Boy in the Bright Blue Jeans) (0:41) 

The Suite is introduced by a short overture; a granular synthesis montage of elements from a number of the Ziggy tracks, stretched and twisted into a new soundscape.

2 Golden Showers (January 72)  (3:35) 

On a cold and wet night in January 1972 our cast assembles under the street lamps in a quiet cul de sac off Regent St, London, namely Heddon St. Creating a backdrop to the scene "Golden Showers" takes a very familiar 3/4 drum pattern as its starting point and laces it with staccato bursts of feedback Ronson guitar and romantic piano flourishes.  "It was cold and it rained..."

3 Cortege (3:09) 

The tracks starts with a revolving organ pattern, over which can be heard the old manual dialling sound of a phone as someone rings the Heddon St box.  Next the track moves into processional mode with Ziggy repeating "Rock, Rock, Rock N Roll", before the dark coated funereal horns arrive, and the Cortege makes its way up from Piccadilly and into Heddon St proper.

4 Heartache in Heddon St ( 5:46) 

A blustery day out in Heddon St, as our hero revisits the scene of past romances ("Lucy stayed at home to starve").  The track starts with the distant sound of traffic and passers by, In the background Ziggy repeats a slow "Bom, Bom, B-Bom Bom" as above piano's tinkle and a piccolo picks out a mournful tune.

5 Scene Change  (1:13) 

A breathing space for the cast to get their breaths back whilst out in the Street the finishing touches are put to the new set.  Almost ambient, granular synthesised elements from Ziggy float past.

6 Through a Telephone Box Darkly (5:10) 

"When the kids had killed the man..." a slow mantra for now the departed main man with full backing from sweeping mellotrons and the Vienna Boys’ Choir. 

7 Weird & Gilly Ride Again (4:22) 

After the sadness and despair of "Through a Telephone Box Darkly", hope comes again as Weird and Gilly pick themselves up and prepare for the long journey home.  The track combines the first and last sounds of "Rock N Roll Suicide", namely the final string chord of the LP and the strummed guitar intro to create a number that has more than a hint of the spaghetti Western about it as our two heroes ride off into the sunset.

 

 

Philip Sanderson - No No No No

1. No No No No

2. Future Derivatives

3. Bubble Drum

4. Scream Test

5. Swingers

6. Beddy Buys

7. Print Through

8. Holding Little Hands

 

Credits:

Format: Download. Plus 5 CD-R

Release Date: 2016

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: None

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson

 

Notes:

No No No No is a collection of tracks recorded using an emulation of the EMS VCS3 made in Max/MSP by Sanderson over which vocals were added, often in one or two takes. Sent out in very limited numbers (no more than 5) as a Christmas CD-R with a hand drawn cover (see second image) then made available as a download.

 

Review:

Review by Sam Davies from the May 2017 edition of the Wire magazine:

Philip Sanderson was first musically active as part of the duo Storm Bugs on the early 1980s cassette scene, a DIY scene predicated on cheap reproduction, and the Bandcamp era offers such micro-cultures an ideal second life (for now.) So as well as making the original output of Storm Bugsí Snatch Tapes label available, itís also given Sanderson an outlet for a run of new tapes. No No No No, on which Sanderson mutters cut-up incantations over different grades of electronic mudslide, doesnít sound out of place in 2017 either; like Mordant Music, Ship Canal or Hacker Farm, itís a very English sound. Made with the means to hand, and completely unafraid of grime or decay; these are sounds left out of the fridge, pulled out from under sofas, disinterred from lofts with a dusting of fibreglass.

 

Various - Your Song, My Foot! Vol. 3: The 1979 Edition

Side A

Storm Bugs Full Moon in My Pocket (Tail Light) 

The Righteous Yeah Fite Dem Back 

Tomutonttu Dernière Croisade 

Infinite Article The Void 

German Army Do The Dog 

Strotter Inst. 79 Dehinnorstuuww 

The Dead Mauriacs Take A Card, Imagine A Gas, See Music As Escaping Water, It's A Test 

Natalia Beylis Demoncrats 

 

Side B

Phew The Void 

Mike Cooper Money Jungle 

Ed Bear Various Times 

The Pheromoans Cold Turkey 

Stuart Chalmers Untitled 

The Driver Of The Hearse Interzone 

Storm Bugs Full Moon In My Pocket (Port Sight) 

Gen Ken* & Julian Cartwright High Pressure Days

 

Credits:

Format: Cassette compiled by Daniel Blumin as WFMU fundraiser

Release Date: 2019

Label: None

Catalogue Number: None

Sleeve Design: Mayuko Fujino, illustration by John Godbert 

 

Notes:

The tracks on the album are all cover versions of songs that apperaed on debut LPs in 1979. The cover illustration is by John Godbert, the artist who drew the cover of The Fall's 1979 LP - Live at the Witch Trials. Of the design John says, "It’s based on a wooden statue of a female figure that was found in a loch in the Scottish Highlands in the 19th century. She was a goddess who protected the loch & turned out to be 5,000 yrs old. This is very “Witch Trials” related, and MES would have liked it."

 

The tape includes two versions by The Sorm Bugs of the Swell Maps track "Full Moon In My Pocket" recorded in New Cross and Elephant & Castle.

Various Artists - ContraPop Festival 2018: The Third And Tidal Report

CD1

1 Laraaji - By The Laws Of Manifestation

2 Flower-Corsano Duo - Cocaa Mouth Paralysis

3 Sacred Paws - ust Kids

4 Massicot - Suri Gruti

5 Teeth Of The Sea- Field Punishment

6 DJ Airplane and Spaceship* - The Drum Slave

7 Molly Nilsson - American Express

 

CD2

1 Otherworld - Forgotten Light VII

2 Dave Kane, Alex Neilson, Chris Sharke, and Alex Ward

3 Yuri Landman - On The 1st Of Feb

4 The Storm Bugs - Take It To The Top

5  Adrian Sherwood - Just Programme It

6 Coldnose - Memories

7 Margenrot - Aghves / Zangezur / Spitak

 

Credits:

Format: CD

Release Date: 2019

Label: Extra Normal

Catalogue Number: TXN 010

Sleeve Design: Oliver Barrett

 

Notes:

ContraPop is a music festival which takes place in a marquee on the baech in Ramsgate, Kent, UK. To accompany the festival a CD is produced showcasing tracks from the previous year's festival, thus this 2019 CD includes the live performance of 'Take It To The Top' by The Storm Bugs from 2018.

 

Ice Yacht - Pillbox

Side A

1. Pillbox 13:30

2. Up and Over 01:28

 

Side B

3. Slow Water 09:09

4. Ice Spikes 05:36

 

All tracks by Philip Sanderson.

 

Credits:

Release Date: 2020

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: tch 219

Sleeve Design: Layout and painting by Philip Sanderson

Reviews:

Review by Frans de Waard - Vital Weekly, number 1243 week 30

 

A few years ago I reviewed 'Pole Of Cold' by Ice Yacht, a musical project by former Storm Bug Philip Sanderson (Vital Weekly 981). Between then (2015) and now, Sanderson became more active and usually under his name. I am not sure why he pulled out the moniker Ice Yacht again unless it is to say that this is something quite different from his other work, which is quite electronic and at times 'poppy' (a term to be used carefully). As Ice Yacht we find him in a more abstract modus operandi. During the April lockdown he went out on the "Romney Marshes to capture ‘wild sound’, be it rusty gates, distant warehouse activity on the river Rother, or short wave radio signals", which back home were moulded into four pieces of music. Sanderson calls it "badly treated and manipulated before being fed into feedback loops", which may suggest something noisy and gruesome and that it surely is not. It is not necessarily very quiet and ambient. Rusty it surely is, and we can connect Ice Yacht to the many musicians working with similar strategies of lo-fi ambience based on field recordings taped onto old cassettes. It lacks Sanderson's current electronic and 'poppy' edge and sees him returning to the loopy scratched records of Storm Bugs, but perhaps less loopy and scratched. Different techniques and more experience in crafting experimental music resulting in thirty minutes of fine sonic bliss and at that, I must say, all too short. I would have loved more of this today. Had I known where I kept the download of the previous one, I would have played that straight after this. Now, I settled for this twice and that also went down well. (FdW) 

 

Review by Neil Kulkarni The Wire September 2020 

Sanderson has also put out new recordings under the name Ice Yacht, and Pillbox is four tracks of purely instrumental composition, wherein his vocal absence allows for a more introspective and wintry unfolding of his fascinations. The two long pieces here are key. “Slow Water" seems to follow an Antarctic dredger through an endless night, signs of life dopplering off downwards from its implacable movement, and "Pillbox" is isolationism par excellence, the terror and beauty of an endless ice shelf surveyed with a laser-like, steadicam feel, before unseen megabeasts start breaking through the mantle and pulling you under. 

Philip Sanderson - The Ringing of a Bell

 

 1. The Ringing of a Bell 16:45

Unknown Bell Ringer: Single Bell Toll.

Philip Sanderson: Sound Manipulation.. 

Credits:

Format: Bandcamp Download

Release Date: 2022

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: None

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson 

Notes:

And so the Queen is dead, and the bell tolls 96 times – what can be drawn from this dull and dutiful repetition, dong, dong, dong, neither building nor climaxing, an endless anticipation, a ceremony of the senses, an everything of nothing, a shrill shell. 

 

Let us take just one single toll of the bell and see if out of that metal on metal we can conjure something befitting… 

 

I give you The Ringing of a Bell

Philip Sanderson - Lost With All Hands

1. LOST WITH ALL HANDS (The Legend of Goodwin Sands) 19:04

2. The Mourning After 20:52

Music Side A & B: Philip Sanderson 

Vocals and lyrics Side A: George Gilbert - from the album Medway Flows Softly - Songs of Kent by George Gilbert.

Credits:

Format: Bandcamp Download

Release Date: 2022

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: None

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson 

Notes:

Goodwin Sands is a sandbank off the coast of Deal in Kent notorious as the site of shipwrecks and the loss of thousands of lives. The perils of the sands and the phantom vessels that haunt it have been the subject of folk songs and poems. LOST WITH ALL HANDS locates itself within this narrative. The two elements of the piece are an electronic soundscape combined with a reworking of a folk song The Legend of Goodwin Sands that originally appeared on the 1974 LP Medway Flows Softly - Songs of Kent by George Gilbert. The soundscape was made using granular synthesis with the shifting atoms echoing the particles on the sands, whilst Gilbert’s voice has been electronically processed to generate an accompanying crew/chorus of voices. Side B - The Mourning After employs pulse comb filters excited by a range of audio sources including location recordings in Kent, vocals and shortwave radio.

credits

 

Ice Yacht -Noisy Nylon

Side A

1. Nitty Nora (Head Explorer) 03:37

2. Underneath The Underneath 02:42

3. Teen Scene 05:05

4. Dépêche-Toi (Hurry Up) 04:18

5. Break Their Legs so They Can't Lay Eggs 04:17

Side B

6. Running From Ghosts 13:09

7. Jizzy Jazz 05:54

Credits:

Format: MC 30 copies, Bandcamp Download

Release Date: 2022

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: tch 223

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson 

 

Notes: Philip Sanderson: various software, vocals, guitar, shortwave radio, MFB Nanozwerg, and artwork.

Reviews:

"...excursions of cosmic music being crushed by the wheels of hard-hitting pop industrialism. A great blast!" Frans de Waard Vital weekly number 1336

Philip Sanderson - Passionate Particles

Tracklist:

1 Lay-by Lullaby

2 Omeletto

3 Feeding Time 

4 Body Snatcher

5 Crystal Set 

6 Down A Denny Lane 

7 Kite 

8 Racing The Arctic Shadow 

9 Summer With The Snow Bees 

10 Pity The Small 

11 View From A Hill 

12 Rumble Of The Ruins 

13 Slow Water 

14 Morphover & Curl 

15 Cash Back

16 Swing 

17 Colour Buffer

 

All tracks by Philip Sanderson

 

Credits:

Format: CD 300 copies

Release Date: 2022

Label: Klanggalerie

Catalogue Number: gg378

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson 

 

Notes:

Passionate Particles is an hour-long compilation of tracks drawn from LP, CD, MC, and DL releases made between 2000 and 2021.

 

Reviews:

 

PHILIP SANDERSON - PASSIONATE PARTICLES (CD by Klanggalerie)

 

I like Austria's Klanggalerie label because they are not strictly a re-issue label, even when a considerable part of their catalogue is about giving old releases a new life. They also like their old artists to release new music, which is great. Please don't stick to your old guns, but also care about new music, as we will see today and in the next few weeks; I got a few of their recent releases. Today I'd like to start with Philip Sanderson. As you may know, Sanderson began his musical career in the late 70s with the Storm Bugs and his Snatch Tapes label. For many years he worked his own name (next to a more ambient oriented side project as Ice Yacht), and 'Passionate Particles' can be seen as a re-issue but not of one particular old release. Rather, it is a collection of pieces from the last twenty years that found their way to a plethora of formats (LP, cassettes, downloads, CDR). I enjoyed Storm Bugs in the past, but Sanderson's work is totally my thing. It is a no-brainer that I picked his album first from the bundle of Klanggalerie. Since the release of 'On One Of Those Bends' (Vital Weekly 1177), I have paid particular attention to his work. There is something lovely pop music about his work. I recently (Vital Weekly 1290; two of the pieces from that cassette are also on this CD) connected to Sparks, especially in his vocal delivery. That is not yet as strong on the sixteen pieces on 'Passionate Particles', except for the two pieces from Not Even My Closest Friends', but poppy it certainly is. Not the naff kind that is popular with the kids these days, but lovely music for adults. All electronic and sometimes instrumental bring a fine balance to the album. I would think that if you love Sparks or The Residents (who have a strong presence in the Klanggalerie as well), Sanderson's music will go down well, even without the guitar parts that these days seem to play a more significant role with The Residents (so I am told, not being the biggest fan there; odd, come to think of it). Sanderson's music isn't per se uptempo and upbeat, but moody and introspective, next to being quirky and pleasant; another excellent act of balancing there. Obviously, you'd find none of these tunes in any top ten, which is a great pity. This is precisely the sort of music that deserves a bigger audience; if only the world would listen! Today it rained a lot, but this release put a big smile on my face. It went straight to repeat, just as yesterday. Next up is some more of his music, as I call it a day and I want to enjoy some more wacky tunes! (FdW)

 

From Vital Weekly 1322 February 2022

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Steven Ball - Middle Footscray

1.Take One 03:48

2. Down the Dip 02:07

3. Morning Folds 04:09

4. Bloody Hell Good Boy 02:10

5. Shelf Stacker 00:49

6. Man Overboard 02:53

7. Coffee Bean Ant 02:24

8. Wooden Piano 01:12

9. Seddon Junction 00:30

10. Deep Problem 00:27

11. Failure of Nerve 03:09

12. Umbel 13:47

13. Up the Sides 02:51

 

Credits:

Format: Bandcamp download

Release Date: 2016

Label: Snatch Tapes

Catalogue Number: None

Sleeve Design: Steven Ball

 

Notes:

All tracks by Steven Ball recorded in Footscray, Melbourne, Australia, 1997 - 1999. Tracks 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, & 8 recorded 1997 tracks 2, 9, 10, & 11 recorded 1998 track 13 recorded 1999. All tracks constructed using various shareware, sampled found sound, ambient room and field recordings. Tracks 1, 4, & 6 constructed entirely from found audio rushes from an unidentified Australian film. Track 12 is the soundtrack to the super 8 film ‘Umbel' by Ooni Peh. Lomograph by Steven Ball 1997.