My radio-based installation Hive had its second outing at the Latitude festival in July. 

50 or more radios, each tuned to a different station and left to run simultaneously in an enclosed dome. All possible radio sources broadcasting simultaneously in one location. 

We are inundated with information all the time. This installation examines how one filters this information.
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15,000 people visited the installation at Latitude. It was very interesting to watch how they interacted with it.

There was quite a bit of media interest, including BBC Click and ITN News, and Max Reinhardt from BBC Radio 3's excellent Late Junction show. Here's his Latitude write-up.

The BBC also interviewed me for the Today Programme on Radio 4. I'd never heard the Today Programme before; I'm not known as an early riser.

I was asked to install Hive by Dr Marius Kwint in association with the Wellcome Trust.

The installation connects very closely with the work scientists are carrying out at the cutting edge of auditory research, investigating the ways that we interpret and filter multiple auditory signals: The cocktail party effect and other processes relating to the acoustics of three dimensional spaces, pattern recognition, and familiarity through repetition and cultural experiences.

Marius chaired a talk with me and music psychologist Dr Vicky Williamson to discuss the science behind Hive's immersive acoustic. Vicky gave her insight into the current thinking: We now know that information doesn't simply flow as one-way traffic from the ears to the brain to be processed; as much information passes in the opposite direction, with the brain actively instructing the ears what to listen out for.

Interestingly, closing your eyes while listening doesn't simply enhance listening by denying visual stimuli, it is now understood that the act of doing this physiologically changes the way the brain and ears function, and alters the listening experience at a fundamental level.

The film at the top of this blog is made from stills taken inside the dome at Latitude, manipulated by film-maker and animator Amy Engels. 

Thanks are due to Marius Kwint, Vicky Williamson, Richard Wingate, Tania Harrison from Latitude, Amy Sanders from the Wellcome Trust and Andy James. And especially to Richard and all at Ruark for the kind loan of your great radios. 

And I would like to thank the Guardians of the Portal of Noise - Toni, Ed, Amy and Alex, who babysat the dome for hours at a stretch.

​It sounds like chaos at first, but it's calming once you're used to it. I slept in there one night.

Next Thursday 4th April 2013, I'm joining up with Mercury Rev's Cinematic Silent Sound Tettix Wave Ensemble for a gig at Koko in Camden, North London.  We're being joined by drummer / percussionist Martin Smith of Tuung, so the full name of the band is Mercury Rev's Cinematic Silent Sound Tettix Wave Ensemble Featuring Nick Franglen and Martin Smth, or MRCSSTWEFNFAMS for short. 

This festival evening - Mouth to Mouth - is being curated by Michael Gira of Swans:  Ben Frost, Xiu Xiu and Grouper in support, then us, and Swans headline the show.  It's a great lineup.  If you've not seen Swans before, they'll blow your fucking socks off, incredible - see below.  Here's an excellent interview with Swans drummer Thor on The Quietus site.  We of MRCSSTWEFNFAMS will be creating a live soundtrack to a film, and it's going to be special and unrepeatable.  Click here for more details and tickets.

Also it's the first time I'll have played at Koko, which is a big deal for me. It was my haunt for my teenage years when it was the Music Machine -  saw The Clash, Siouxsie etc there, and was there on the opening night after Steve Strange and Rusty Egan had dolled it up and reopened it as the what-the-fuck-have-they-done-to-it Camden Palace. They kept the old bouncers though, just so the transition wasn't too abrupt.  Maybe they're still there, with their single leather gloves and cheery disposition.

...there's only one great Cowell in music.  Henry Cowell - The Banshee for solo piano, 1925.

This is basic plucking or The Staunton Lick. Or at least this is what it sounded like before we messed with it. And a Pig. I should play it a bit quicker but I've hurt my finger. And Mirkin kept falling off. Etc.

I'm prepping for the Nico show on the 16th, getting sounds together and stuff.  And girding my loins for the nightmare polka we always dance at the airport to get my gear through.  Some people can travel light.  Not me.

Love this song.  Shibuya, 1986.

The constant dreams have now stopped, but I'm missing Millennium Mills an enormous amount. It's not just the adrenaline, I loved being in there. A very private world.

Here's the first of the Legacy background films.  I am constructing a solar powered toy rowing boat during a firework display.  Enjoy.

100 solar powered rowing boats competing in the sunlight.  

This is just a test, and it works.  Good fun too.

I saw the flotilla going down the Thames for the Queen's Jubilee Pageant on the TV the day after I filmed this, and while there's no intended connection with that it did make me smile.  I did have a shocking 'oh bloody hell' moment a couple of weeks ago, when I stumbled across a real connection with the Jubilee that I'd have preferred to avoid, but how was I to know the Spirit Of Chartwell would interfere with what I've been surreptitiously beavering away at for the past few months?  Things should be back to normal now.  Well, more normal anyway.

This is half of the consignment of boats that arrived earlier this week from China.  I've still got quite a bit of assembly time ahead of me to put the remainder together - it's not complicated but when you've got 200 of anything a bit fiddly to build, that's ages.  It's either zen or really irritating, and I guess the zen trick is to convince yourself it's zen.

The boats will need to be partially dismantled again so I can get them into their final location as easily as possible, so this lot are only temporarily assembled.  I know they won't fall apart once the oars are attached properly, but I will have to do a bit of weatherproofing to keep the water out.

I am now wrapping up the preparation stages of my Legacy installation - there might be one more thing to check out, but I'm kind of there now with the preparation.  All will be revealed shortly.

3.30am - all alone in a strange place, just the way I like it.

I had just carried another four bags in to join the previous three.  Everything had changed for the worse, so it took me 8 hours to get to this point.  It should be getting easier each time but it's really really not.

Large deserted buildings make a surprising amount of noise and I knew no one else was in the place.  The ticking sound is water dripping through the ceiling.  Getting there.

Ain't solar power great?  If a bit cruel.

Legacy 10 preparation.  Getting there - I'm hoping all the elements of Legacy will come together by the end of May.

Rheingold, Scene II.  An open space on the mountaintops.

 

Music by Wolfgang Sawallisch and Bavarian State Opera, 1991 on EMI. 
Buy it from the great Harold Moore's Records: hmrecords.co.uk/