Apostrophe S Project

Apostrophe S is a trilogy of films by Philip Sanderson and Steven Ball made between 1987 - 1990. A follow up piece Called Film of The Same Name was completed in 2017. The project was shot in north Kent on Higham Marshes and Blue Bell Hill and explores 'geopsychological' issues around landscape - in particular Hangway Turning is based on the urban legend of repeated ghost sightings made on Bluebell Hill, Kent, following the death of a bride-to-be in a road accident in March 1964.

 

The project began with a short pilot called Apostrophe S - A Postcard From Boxley Hill made from Super 8 Loops projected onto a wall and then videod. The soundtrack was recorded by Sanderson & Ball at IPS Studios in London with the voice-over by Diana Gordon.

Funding was secured from South East Arts to make Green on The Horizon. This was shot on Cliffe Marshes in Kent and features Angela Staples. The piece was shot on Super 8 and then edited on Umatic video.

 Following Ball's departure to Australia Sanderson completed the next part of the trilogy Hangway Turning with Nigel Jacklin (of Alien Brains fame) taking on the role of psychic investigator Thomas Cubiit and Angela Staples playing the 'ghost'.

 

Twenty years plus later Sanderson & Ball decided to revisit the location and ideas behind the Apostrophe S trilogy in The Film of The Same Name. For Film of the Same Name the Cubitt character was re-presented by BFI archivist William Fowler while the ghost by jeweler Leigh Milsom. Directors Sanderson and Ball portray themselves as the now middle-aged experimental filmmakers – maybe older and wiser but having some difficulty in remembering where the original scenes were shot. 

Green on the Horizon and Hangway Turning have been screened at over thirty venues including: Tate, ICA, Osnabruck, Piccadilly Film Festival. Green on The Horizon has been added to the BFI archive and is available on the BFI player, and was most recently shown at the BFI/NFT in November 2022.

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. 

 

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.

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

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

Storm Bugs - Up the Middle Down the Sides

Track Listing

Note: both sides of the LP are collaged into one long track

 

Side A (Mannequins Positive)

1. Lets see what happens if we try doing this (0.26)

2. Water Bottle Wasp (0.22)

3. Little Bob Minor (3.36)

4. Pity the Small (2.10)

5. Protoslap (0.58)

6. Thin Line Flash of Traffic (0.59)

7. Full English Breakfast(0.53)

8. 111 (4.03)

9. Skid Pan Buoy (2.59)

10. Holiday 82 (0.29)

 

Side B (Mannequins Negative)

1. Blackheath Episode (4.54)

2. Later that Same Evening (1.38)

3. Live at Top Shop (0.29)

4. Make Customers Matter (1.44)

5. In the Naked Girl's Majesty (1.01)

6. Wasp Bottle (4.11)

7. Our Main Objective (4.41)

 

Tracks A1, 3, 6, 9, B1, 2, 4, 7 by Philip Sanderson. Tracks A4, 5, 7, 8, 10, B3 by Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball. Tracks A2, B6 by Steven Ball. Track B5 by Philip Sanderson & David Jackman.

 

Credits:

Format: LP, 300 copies

Release Date: 2004

Label: Fusetron

Catalogue Number: Fuse 036

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson & Steven Ball

 

Notes:

The sleeve features an anamorphic projection, to decipher use a small reflective tube (see rear of cover for diagram)

 

Side A (Mannequins Positive)

1. Lets see what happens if we try doing this (0.26)

Recorded Deptford 1979 (previously unreleased)

PS: Vocals, Guitar, Short Wave

SB: Guitar, Short Wave

 

2. Water Bottle Wasp (0.22)

Recorded Maidstone 1981 (previously unreleased)

SB: Bottle, Wasp, Water

 

3. Little Bob Minor (3.36)

Recorded New Cross 1979 (From the Dark Cuttings cassette)

PS: VCS3

 

4. Pity the Small (2.10)

Recorded Strood 1980 (previously unreleased)

PS: Loops

SB: Loops and Vocal

 

5. Protoslap (0.58)

Recorded Elephant & Castle 1981 (previously unreleased)

PS: Vibes, Dr Rhythm

SB: Drums, Dr Rhythm

 

6. Thin Line Flash of Traffic (0.59)

Recorded Paddington 1980 (From Snatch 2)

PS: Scratched Records, Vocals, Guitar, Short Wave

 

7. Full English Breakfast(0.53)

Recorded Deptford 1978 (previously unreleased)

PS: Guitar, Short Wave

SB: Guitar, Short Wave

 

8. 111 (4.03)

Recorded Paddington 1980 (previously unreleased)

PS: Ring Modulator Loops

 

9. Skid Pan Buoy (2.59)

Recorded Deptford 1979 (From Dark Cuttings)

PS: Scratched Records, Guitar, Vocals

 

10. Holiday 82 (0.29)

Recorded Elephant & Castle 1981 (previously unreleased)

PS: Dr Rhythm

SB: Vibes

 

Side B (Mannequins Negative)

1. Blackheath Episode (4.54)

Recorded New Cross 1980 (From A Safe Substitute)

PS: VCS3

 

2. Later that Same Evening (1.38)

Recorded Deptford 1978 ((From Dark Cuttings)

PS: Guitar, Short Wave

 

3. Live at Top Shop (0.29)

Recorded Deptford 1978 ((previously unreleased)

PS: Vocals, Oscillator

 

4. Make Customers Matter (1.44)

Recorded Deptford 1980 (From Gift)

PS: Vocals, Guitar, Harmonica, Scratched Records

 

5. In the Naked Girl's Majesty (1.01)

Recorded Paddington 1980 ((previously unreleased)

PS: Vocals, Loops

David Jackman: Loops

 

6. Wasp Bottle (4.11)

Recorded Maidstone 1981 (previously unreleased)

SB: Bottle, Wasp, Water

 

7. Our Main Objective (4.41)

Recorded New Cross 1980 (From the Table Matters EP)

PS: VCS3, Vocals, Guitar

 

Philip Sanderson - Seal Pool Sounds Limited Edition Box

A box set version of the Seal Pool CD limited to 25 copies. As well as the main Seal Pool CD, it includes an additional CD-R with two long drone tracks. All the boxes are hand made in Japan by John Podeszwa and feature various photographs and ephemera sourced by him.

Tracklisting 

CD as per regular Seal Pool Sounds

CD-R:

Fluorescent

Osaka by Night

 

Credits

Format: CD 25 of 500 copies, CD-R/Box, 25 copies

Release Date: 2005

Label: Seal Pool

Catalogue Number: None

Sleeve Design: John Podeszwa

Storm Bugs - A Safe Substitute (CD)

1. Mesh of Wire/Objective/Car Situations/Mesh of Wire (Reprise)

2. Hodge

3. Solely From

4. Blackheath Episode

Bonus Tracks

5. He Rose up Again

6. 333

7. Table Matters Soundtrack

 

Philip Sanderson: VCS3 (1-5,7), vocals (1), tape loops (1,6,7), short wave radio (2), guitar (7)

Steven Ball: vocals (1), percussion (1,6), tape loops (6) 

Sarah Pomeroy: guitar/VCS3 (1)

All tracks by Sanderson except "Car Situations" and "333" by Sanderson & Ball 

 

Credits:

Format: CD, 300 copies

Release Date: 2020

Label: Klanggalerie

Catalogue Number: gg337

Sleeve Design: Philip Sanderson and Steven Ball. The sleeve images are from the Storm Bugs Super 8 film Table Matters (1980) by Steven Ball

 

Notes:

Originally released on cassette by Snatch Tapes in 1980, this 40th anniversary re-issue on CD by Klanggalerie contains a gently remastered version of the original tape plus three bonus tracks, two of which ("333" and "Table Matters Soundtrack") have not previously been released.

Purchase this CD

Storm Bugs - Metamorphose (Tin/Car Situations)

Side A 

Tin 

 

Side B

Car Situations

Both tracks by Philip Sanderson and Steven Ball. Philip Sanderson: loops, vocals, treatments. Steven Ball: guitar, bass, lead vocals.

 

Credits:

Format,: 7 inch single, 1,470 copies

Release Date: 1981

Label: L'invitation au Suicide 

Catalogue Number: L'invitation 0100

Sleeve and label Design: Yann Farcy

 

Notes:

Whereas the first Storm Bugs single was recorded by Sanderson on a two-track Revox tape machine the second Storm Bugs single was a collaborative affair between Sanderson and Ball using a multitrack recorder. Sanderson first created a drum loop from a bongo using various tape collage techniques. Over this he developed a rough guitar part and the vocal line.  Ball honed the guitar part into a more formal chord sequence and wrote a bass part. The two then recorded and mixed the song on an 8-track multitrack tape machine in an afternoon. The music for side B was built up from layers of tape loops made by Sanderson on top of which the vocal line was added by Ball. The lyrics to Car Situations had been written by Sanderson and Ball in Paddington using cut-up phrases from sources such as John Cage's book Silence. The release was the first on the French L'invitation au Suicide label. The single came in a 10-inch sleeve entitled Metamorphose. The design differed considerably from that which the band had agreed with the label and was disowned by them.