October 11, 2014

9.45 pm. The studio and the study needed a dust and a vacuum. In preparing the work environment, I’m conscious that the inner man is also being put to order. And the manner in which we acquit ourselves of ‘the trivial round and common task’ is a measure of our integrity: ‘He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much’ (Luke 16.10). I fail the test so often:

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Electronic sound devices (of which I’ve a not inconsiderable number) emit an electro-static charge that attracts a great deal of dust. On a recent tour of the BBC radio studios at Salford, I asked how often the equipment was cleaned. ‘Everyday’!, was the reply. I cannot compete.

2.00 pm. I began setting up filter devices to effect the output from a circuit-bending exercise that I hope to demonstrate at the university Open Day on the 18 October. I’ve not practiced the technique since I was 16-years old. I stumbled upon the potential by accident while attempting to fix a portable radio. (Today, it’s a sub-genre of what is called ‘noise music’.) For anyone who could not afford a synthesizer in the mid 1970s (and that was most people), the squelches, screeches, and hums produced by connecting circuits that ordinarily aren’t was the only way to achieve an engaging and usable electronic sound. The approach is not without its hazards; frequently the adapted devices short circuit permanently, or else components on the circuit board burn out.

I worked up a draft of the publicity material and icons for the demonstration:

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By 5.00 pm, I’d set-up the more sophisticated and expensive end of the rig that’ll be using in the project, and prepared a number of redundant or failing electronic devices for probing, tomorrow.

An evening with the family:

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