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Time to enjoy the past, present and future of electronic music again with EarSpace Episode 36.

This month we slip back in time to hear Flying Lotus and Arovane, get cinematic with Mark Jenkins and meditate with Detroit’s Carl Craig.

There’s synthetic joys from Colleen, Sulk Rooms, Plant43, Xordox, and rhythmic intensity from Upsammy & Valentina Magaletti.

dd Seefeel, Carl Stone, Yann Novak, Speedy J, Deaf Center and many more to the mix and EarSpace Ep.26 is a joy to the soul.

Looking forward to playing in Birmingham in the UK this weekend. Been many, many years since I played a solo show there so hope some of you can make it along!

“Radio remains compelling for me precisely because it resists control, and I’ve never tried to ‘tame’ that unpredictability—instead, I treat it as a live collaborator, something between an environment and an instrument,” he explains. “It brings with it fragments of the world: voices, atmospheres, interference, accidental poetry. My role is to listen very attentively and decide, in real time, how to frame or respond to what arrives.”

I am delighted to feature in an article celebrating the power of radio waves in music, with an interview, and music featured alongside John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Tod Dockstader, Olivia Block and more.

Time to celebrate the genius of British composer and music producer David Cunningham (b.1954), otherwise known as The Flying Lizards. For many people their tunes are familiar via their quirky cover versions of “Summertime Blues” and “Money,” the latter of which takes a popular Beatles tune and plays it out in truly economical style, playful, unsettling and still startlingly modern. I love this dismantling of familiar pop music and then rebuilding it with tape loops, deadpan vocals, dub space and conceptual wit. I have huge admiration for the astonishing costs of this production, as he apparently recorded it with a budget of about £5.00, “and a couple of bus tickets.” David’s work outside of the ‘hits’ is very impressive though and a huge influence on my own work. He’s performed with everyone from John Cage to Pan Sonic, produced and recorded bands as varied as This Heat, Sn**ch, and Jayne County and the Electric Chairs, produced music for Peter Greenaway’s films and BBC television, and created simple, mind-blowing sound installations at places like the Tate Britain, ICC Tokyo, and random lifts in apartment buildings. His soundtrack to the Ken McMullen film Ghost Dance (1983) is one of my absolute favourites, and amazingly features Jamie Muir, formerly of King Crimson! And yes, we’ve worked together quite a few times. We first recorded music together in 1995, and went on to perform together in London, Oslo and other places, combining electronics and guitar in wonderful improvisations. And remember, “the recording contains analogue tape distortion, noise and hiss which, besides being unavoidable, at times form an integral part of the music.” Decades later, his minimalist gestures still echo through contemporary music culture. It’s ssential listening for anyone fascinated by the beautiful tension between pop and experiment

Wandering around Prague today brings to mind the work of Jan Švankmajer, the extraordinary Czech filmmaker, animator, writer, playwright and artist. He also draws and makes graphics, collage, ceramics, tactile objects and assemblages. His work remains quite unlike anything else in cinema and contemporary art. Through stop-motion animation, tactile collage, puppetry, and dark humour, he transforms ordinary objects into unsettling, poetic, and deeply political visions. From the nightmarish beauty of Alice to the anarchic textures of Dimensions of Dialogue, Švankmajer’s work reminds us that the imagination can still disrupt reality. In his hands everything can come alive, from food to clay, toys to bones. He’s a key figure of Czech Surrealism, with his influence stretching across film, experimental music, visual art, and animation, inspiring generations from the Brothers Quay to countless contemporary artists working with the uncanny and the handmade. To see one of his films is a magical experience and if you aren’t familiar with them, just watch one of his many short films online. It’s work that breathes with subconscious desire and unease, whilst often making you smile at the same time, albeit in a slightly unsettled way. His work is essential viewing for anyone fascinated by the strange poetry hidden inside everyday life.

Poster for forthcoming shows I'm performing at in Prague, with Eno and Bryars next week, and then Stockhausen and Oliveros in June which is exciting.

Hope to see some of you there then!

Brian Eno

So pleased to hear my sound installation today at Malagola Ravenna as part of their permanent collection. It’s very difficult to capture an 8-channel surround sound work in a little clip, but it offers an idea at least.

The work is entitled ‘Together’ and I wanted to take that single word—spoken, whispered, fractured, overheard—and stretch it across the shifting emotional terrain of our current world. We live in a moment defined as much by distance as by connection, where unity feels essential yet increasingly fragile.

Each iteration of together is stretched, folded, granulated or submerged, sometimes surfacing with clarity, sometimes dissolving into abstract textures. As the layers accumulate, they form a sonic ecology that is both intimate and collective, echoing the precarious balance of community today.

In this space, the word together becomes a chorus of many, a reminder that even in troubling and uncertain times, our connection to one another remains one of the most powerful forces we possess.

A release just out, to which I contributed two exclusive tracks, is ‘gravity,’ a compilation of remixes of tracks taken from ‘the magnitude weighs heavy’, the 2025 album from Philadelphia-area producer alka.

Revealing new facets and pathways in the original tracks, the collection features mixes from alka collaborator Vince Clarke, Veryan, Stubbleman (Pascal Gabriel), Gareth Jones, Simon Fisher Turner and others.

I’m especially proud of my mixes here and hope you get a chance to listen to them. There was a limited CD of this but it sold out on the morning of the release, so it’s too late to encourage you to pick that up, but support the release if you can, on Bandcamp now.

Excited to return to play live in Catania for the first time in about twenty years! Thanks to everyone who has sent photos of posters around town too 😀

Hope to see some friendly faces on Sunday 3 May at Zō Centro Culture Contemporanee

It's that time of the month again, with EarSpace episode 35 on Slack City Radio

Slipping between the past, present and future of electronic music, this month I bring you another colourful array of sounds.

There’s beautifully elegiac music from Flin van Hemmen and Anichy & Lyemn, dubbed out beats from Trois-Quarts Taxi-System and Alan & Jan, blasts from the past with Panasonic and Snd, and new sounds from Venetian Snares, Plaid, Aspetuck, Thomas Brinkmann, Ezekiel Honig, Suzanne Ciani and Actress.

Music to dream to, and music to dance to.