First gig of the new year and it’s only 3 weeks away! I’ll be doing some sort of AV DJ set at this on the 24th, possibly the O Is For Orange set or variation of. Funki tells me it will be a loose multimedia kind of vibe with workshops, Q&A with artists and performance. Tickets here
As is the custom on this blog, Dec 31st heralds my personal favourites of the year in various categories, leaving it until the last moment to make sure as much gets caught in the net before we flip to 2026. Despite the horrors we experience through the media daily, 2025 was a bit of a vintage year for me personally with new work and family milestones reached despite the hardships all around us. This year has been hugely productive and I’ve released a few things, designed a lot and contributed to several big projects that I’m super proud of. The Autumn was dominated by the Telepathic Fish compilation, something that out-performed our expectations by some way and rumbled into the winter months, making several end of year lists to our delight.
This is not the last word on the Fish…
Music:
Snapped Ankles – Hard Times Furious Dancing LP (the Leaf Label)
clipping. – Dead Channel Sky LP (Sub Pop)
Paten Locke – Dance On My Grave LP (Full Plate)
Hieroglyphic Being – Dance Music 4 Bad People LP (Smalltown Supersound)
Hieroglyphic Being – RE-SELECTED PSYBIENT JAZZ SOUNDSCAPES VOL. 1+2 (Mathematics)
Move 78 – Game Four LP (self-released)
Marshall Jefferson – Yellow Meditation For The Dance Generation (Joakim’s Horizontal Remix Instrumental) (Utter)
Stereolab – Instant Holograms On Metal Film LP (Warp/Duophonic)
Telefax Productions – Break This House Down 12″ (Classic Music Company)
Coastal County – II LP (Lomas Productions)
Kif Productions – Still Out LP (Sound Records)
Move 78 – In The Age of Data (self-released)
Group Modular – The Tunnel / Lonely Pylon 7″ (Delights)
Jo Johnson – Alterations vol.1 LP (Silver Threads)
Podcasts:
What Went Wrong?
Some Assembly Required
Tales From A Disappearing City
The Bureau of Lost Culture
What Did You Do Yesterday?
Oh God What Now?
Rule of Three
The Adam Buxton Podcast
We Buy Records
The Fanzine Podcast
Gigs / Events / Exhibitions:
Eno and Anne B @ the British Library, London
Mick Jones’ RRPL @ The Farsight Gallery, London
Visiting Neil Rice’s home with friends for a personal light show display
Linder Sterling @ The Hayward, London
Leigh Bowery @ The Tate Modern, London
Strangely Familiar – Photographer’s Gallery, London
The Dream House, East Dulwich, London
Future Language of the Ikonoklast book launch @ Greyhound Pub, Peckham
My 2hr gig turning into 3 hours @ Cabron Bar, Folkestone
The Epic Story of Graffiti, Birmingham
Telepathic Fish launch party @ Arch555, London
The Jonny Halifax Invocation play Ravi Shankar, Mildmay Club, London
Beautify Junkyards @ Waiting Rooms, London
The closing of the Penge street art gallery, London
Barry Kamen @ Graces Mews, London
Obey/Hirst/Invader – Newport Street Gallery, London
Welcome To The Pleasuredome LP Atmos playback @ L-Acoustic studios, London then pub visit with the Universal team + Holly and Ped!
Furrowed residency @ Rose Hill Tavern, Brighton
Factory Floor and Sculpture @ Simple Things festival, Bristol
The Audiovisual Assembly, @ Bath House, Hackney Wick, London
Packaging / Design:
Got to say, I’ve been a bit underwhelmed by a lot of the design I’ve seen this year, not a lot stood out. The fashion seems to be either surrealist photography in an attempt to ape Hypngosis or terrible painting. Typography on front covers is the exception rather than the rule. I thought maybe I’d just not been paying attention but googling a bunch of ‘best covers of 2025’ lists only reinforced my opinion. It’s all subjective though isn’t it? I didn’t see much if any AI in the lists which is good.
Various Artists – Rave Wars: The Acid Awakens 7″ + Star Wars figure (Rave Wars)
Field Lines Cartographer – Apeiron Anxiety LP (Castles In Space)
Drumetrics – DRB 001 4×5″ records in etched box
Kid Koala – Carpal Tunnel Syndrome reissue LP + flexi disc (Ninja Tune)
Krash Slaughta – B-Boy Mastamind 7″ (Krash Slaughta Records)
Sully – Model Collapse etched 12″ (Fabric Live)
Drumetrics – Drumetronome tablet
ES – Planet Beyond – Selected Cuts Vol.1 LP (Ruiger)
Artists:
Kurt Jackson (above)
Ray Tijssen aka 0010×0010
Odeith
Chris Bigg
Oritoor
Toor Pentel
Books / Magazines / Comics:
The Loneliness of the Long Distance Cartoonist – Adrian Tomine (Faber)
UltraMega – James Harren (Image)
Bowling With Corpses – Mike Mignola (Dark Horse)
Robot Tod – Farel Dal (Floating World Comics)
Absolute Martian Manhunter – Camp/Rodriguez (DC)
OK Okapi – Martin Andersen & Chris Bigg
Future Language of the Ikonoklast (Velocity Press)
The Editor’s Cut – David McDonald (Hibernia Books)
Absolute Batman – Snyder/Dragotta/Martin (DC)
Heatwave – John L. Williams (Monoray)
The Absence – Rian Hughes (Unpublished)
A Humument – Tom Phillips (Thames & Hudson) (A late but important discovery)
Granny Takes A Trip – Paul Gorman (White Rabbit)
Bedetruite – Samplerman (LDC)
The Absence – Budgie (White Rabbit)
Face The Music – Paul Stanley
Stephen Stapleton – The Formless Irregular (Timeless)
The Vaughan Oliver Archive (Unit Editions)
Instant Public Art – Ulrich Blanché (Arthistoricum.net) Read here:
Plunderphonics – Matthew Blackwell (Bloomsbury Academic)
Film / TV:
I just have to admit it, I really don’t watch much film or TV and what I see doesn’t do much for me evidently. I did see the Beautiful Losers documentary from 2008 and like it though.
Another year over and what have I done?
Designed the Cobalt 60 LP release for Ollie Teeba & Jonny Cuba
Played at the closing of When Spaceships Appear record shop
Co-compiled and designed the Telepathic Fish compilation, booklet, Float III mixtape and Mindfood 5 fanzine for Fundamental Frequencies
Released the 20th anniversary cassette Raiding the 20th Century Expanded version on Delic Records
Continued my Electrik Collage radio show until April then paused to rethink
Designed the Dan Curtin ‘The 4 Lights’ album for De:tuned
Released the Locked Loop Group 8″ lathe cut zoetrope with Acid Lathe
Designed The Herbaliser Band’s ‘Rehearsal Session’ album
Contributed heavily to the 40th anniversary boxset for Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s ‘Welcome To The Pleasuredome’.
Collaborated with Al White on the Terrace ‘Branches’ LP design for De:tuned
Logo design and branding for OTA Recordings
Provided guest mixes for Oonops Drops on Brooklyn Radio and the 45 Live show on Dublab
Appeared on the Cheap Digs podcast with Moz, the Tales From A Disappearing City podcast with Controlled Weirdness, the Skinny E Media show with Mark, the Do!!You!!! Breakfast show with Charlie Bones and The Bureau of Lost Culture podcast.
Supported the Orb on a few dates of their UK tour
Held an exhibition of Openmind artwork at the Cabron Bar in Folkestone, then also Upside Down Records, Deptford
Contributed a track on the Rave Wars: The Acid Awakens 7″
Held a release party for the Telepathic Fish album at Arch555 in Brixton with Mixmaster Morris, Matt Black and KiF Productions
Taken charge of both the Orion and Pluto lighting archives Larry Wooden (RIP) and Micky Thompson (RIP) from respectively
Revived & updated my O Is For Orange video mix and provided a new version to Bleep for their September guest mix
Created two hour-long Float IV and V mixes for the guest spots on Dublab and Ransom Note respectively.
Finally finished and printed my collage comic, the All Colour, High Fidelity, Radio Cartoon, after 5 years
Designed two zoetropes for Disclosure’s ‘Caracal’ 10th anniversary reissue
Attended the Bound Art Book Fair in Manchester as a seller and speaker then DJed at YES in the evening
Played the Simple Things festival with Graham Dunning and Puttyrubber at the IMAX in Bristol at the behest of Steve Davis
Appeared at the first AudioVisual Assembly gig, performing O Is For Orange alongside The Light Surgeons, Bitvert, Pat Grimm and David Leister
Designed The Real Tuesday Weld’s Crow at Christmas 3″CD Xmas card
Designed Nate Krafft’s Crimson Arsenal/Man Machine reissue for Musique Pour La Danse
The Telepathic Fish LP earns Juno Daily’s and Rough Trade Compilation of the Year (with an exclusive blue vinyl edition for the latter) as well as mentions in the end of year polls by Bleep (with an exclusive T-shirt), Phonica, Resident, Brooklyn Vegan, HHV, Moonbuilding and the New York Times.
Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s Welcome To The Pleasuredome receives Reissue of the Year in Classic Pop magazine as well as compliments from the band.
Recorded an album’s worth of extended turntablism material with Furrowed for a future release
Designed the first cassette for my Infinite Illectrik label, Extended Turntablism vol.1 by Graham Dunning and myself. More to come in 2026…
RIP:
David Lynch, Micky Thompson (Pluto Electronics), Bill Ham (light show pioneer), Marianne Faithfull, Mike Ratledge, Rutherford Chang, Rick Buckler, Roberta Flack, Gwen McCrea, Gene Hackman, David Johansen, Mark Pawson (UK counterculture legend), Roy Ayers, Doug Lear, free speech in America and the UK, John Peck aka The Mad Peck, WH Smiths, Robert McGinnis, Alan Yentob, Sylvester ‘Sly Stone’ Stewart, Brian Wilson, Lalo Schifrin, Luis Jardim, Peter Shapiro, Ozzy Osbourne, Terence Stamp, JD Twitch (Optimo), Larry Wooden (Orion Lighting), Drew Struzan, Ace Frehley, Diane Keaton, Bunny Bread aka State of Art (Non Stop Artists), Dave Ball, Gary ‘Mani’ Mounfield, Pam Hogg, Frank Gehry, Martin Parr, Rob Reiner, Ken Downie (The Black Dog), Brigitte Bardot, Martin Jones (UK Hip Hop historian and early champion).
Currently there are several projects lining up for 2026, I could do with some more DJ gigs and I want to find time to revive the Electrik Collage radio show and make it better than the version that was on ROVR radio. There will be more cassettes from Infinite Illectrik too including a long-projected compilation and an album from Duplokit. Thanks to everyone who read this old-fashioned blog over the year, it may finally get an upgrade in 2026, I hope you all had a great Xmas if you celebrated and wish you all a prosperous New Year. See you on the other side.
Looking forward to:
Foetus’ final LP, ‘Halt’
An Openmind exhibition in Krakow?
More Infinite Illectrik cassettes
Sophia Satchell-Baeza’s The Sensual Laboratories book, finally?
Cineolascape…?
Andrew Humphreys’ ‘I’d Love To Turn You On’ book
The Rogue Trooper film
This weekend (25/26th Oct) I’ll be at the Bound Art Book Fair at the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester with a table selling my latest collage comic, the All Colour High Fidelity Radio Cartoon. This was started in lockdown in 2020 and worked on intermittently for five years until recently when I exhibited some pieces in Folkestone and decided I had enough to assemble a comic/zine/whatever at last.
That had always been the goal but there was no deadline so I just continued to work on pieces for years, slowly building each page to a point where they were ‘finished’. With the Bound Art Book Fair invitation for Saturday, I decided that would make a suitable deadline to compile a first version of these works.
Unless I’ve got a deadline I can tinker with things forever (hence no new DJ Food music in years) and this has been on the Infinite Illecktrik release list since 2020 (ii03 – to be accompanied by an album of the same name but that will come later now). Talking of which, I am also readying some new releases for the label which will take physical form soon…
But I digress, the comic – I’m calling it a comic because a large proportion of it is taken from comics and you can ‘read’ some pages, but really I have no idea what it is – is 32 pages, full colour and includes a free pair of 3D specs to view the centre spread. The first 50 come with a random sticker applied inside and I will have a random selection of badges free for buyers at the fair this weekend.
I’ll also have the new Mindfood zine (issue 5) and very limited original copies of #1,3 & 4 for sale as well as copies of the Float III mixtape and a handful of the Telepathic Fish LPs. Also there will be copies of my Wheels of Light book, the comic book version of my Search Engine album and whatever else I can find.
In addition to that I’ll be giving a talk at 1pm on the Mezzanine about the Telepathic Fish parties and the zines we made at some point on Saturday and in the evening I’ll be playing at YES alongside my good friend Moz. That’s quite an itinerary for Saturday. The comic will go on sale online next week via Bandcamp for those who can’t make the fair.
Bleep are running a competition to win one of two deluxe Telepathic Fish sets – just order the album or sign up to their newsletter to be entered into the raffle before October 2nd. Those who already ordered from Bleep will automatically be entered.
A runner up prize of original Mindfood fanzine issues 1,3 & 4 is also on offer (these are actually rarer than the main prize). We have also just launched a dedicated Telepathic Fish Instagram account for photos, stories, info and upcoming events connected with the parties.
And the Telepathic Fish album press rolls on, apologies for the info dump but I’m trying to keep track of it all.
Here Matt Black remembers the New Years Day party we co-hosted inside the derelict Roundhouse for Juno Daily by Ben Willmott.
Next there’s a Bandcamp piece I took part in where Andy Thomas neatly encapsulates our story, expanded in the booklet that comes with the LP.
Here’s Mario’s opening set from the Telepathic Fish launch party at BoSi on 31st August.
The Bleep Album of the month campaign is in its third week and here’s an exclusive Q&A I did for them if you scroll down.
I also did an interview with Mark from Skinny E Media about my O Is For Orange video mix, the image isn’t too clear but you get some insights into the intentions behind it and my thoughts of Boards on Canada.
Still to come; a piece for Record Collector and mixes for Dublab and Ransom Note. The repressing of the album is due back at the end of the month I’m told.
Very saddened to hear that Larry Wooden passed away today after a short battle with cancer. Here’s a photo I took of him just over a month ago, through a lens we found whilst sorting through boxes of Larry’s life. He was an amazing man, full of ideas, sharp as a pin with a super dry wit. For a 70+ year old I’d regularly get messages from him at 1am and his telephone calls were always long ones.
He was born 1st Feb 1950 at The Limes, Norwich Road, North Walsham, Norfolk. A lover of photography from an early age – something that would influence a lot of his later interests – Larry started drumming lesson at ten years old after wanting to play them since he was seven. At 11 he swapped a previous interest in Hornby trains for a chemistry lab that he would then turn into a photo lab two years later in 1963. The same year, he first saw Dr Who on TV – a show he would love for a lifetime and name his lightshow after. Photographing the Doctor and Daleks directly from the TV, the enterprising Larry would sell the photos at school and make himself a miniature Dalek by studying the images at just 13 years old. During a stint helping him sort through his belongings we chanced upon this model, wrapped up in a box, not too worse for wear despite the 60 years since its creation.
In 1967 he gave up on his A Levels, learned to drive and his family moved to Longs Farm, Tollenshunt Major near Maldon in Essex where his dad was in charge of the Goldhanger Fruit Farms. He saw The Equals live at the Gaiety Theatre in Ramsey and joined his first band, D’Arcy Spice in 1968 alongside Jerry Arnold, Alan Valentine, Alan Jolly and Tony Loton. The same year he founded Orion Lighting and starting making lighting for the band. Their first gig was in 1969 at the Embassy Suite, Colchester with District Line, The Shey and Jimmy Pilgrim & the Classics and then Larry formed Nature’s Way in the summer who gigged relentlessly throughout ’70-71. Larry’s Doctor Who Lighshow was unveiled at the Felixstow Pier Pavilion on 24/04/71 and he would light the likes of The Groundhogs, Van Der Graaf Gernerator, Mott The Hoople, Osibisa, Uriah Heep, Keef Hartley, Desmond Dekkar, Dave & Ansell Collins, Geno Washington, Fleetwood Mac, Hot Chocolate and many more before quitting his day job at the tax office on Xmas Eve of 1971.
Nature’s Way promo shots, Larry in shades, beard and snazzy trousers.
Light shows and gigs continued throughout the early seventies including lighting The Sweet, Queen, Thin Lizzy, 10cc, Cockney Rebel, Suzi Quatro, Screaming Lord Sutch and Emperor Rosko among many more. Somewhere along the way Nature’s Way morphed into Peppermint Way and in early ’74 Larry retired the lightshow to concentrate on his lighting company. Orion made the first picture wheels, custom made control equipment like the 10 Way Chaser and the Spirochaser as well as manufacturing wheels for David Hone’s Solar Prism Lighting. He attended the BADEM (British Association of Discotheque Equipment Manufacturers ) lighting shows in ’76, ’77 and ’78, the latter of which would feature a four page colour Orion leaflet inside the centrefold of the Disco International program.
The Orion shop opened in 1978 at 20 Wethersfield Road, Colchester and ’79 and ’80 saw appearances at the Discom lighting shows in Paris where he demonstrated prototypes of the Galactic Floor – a light up disco flooring. The eighties weren’t kind to Larry though, Orion went bankrupt after the financial crash (like Pluto Electronics and many others), his marriage ended and he worked a succession of jobs and played in several bands to little success. But by the end of the eighties things were looking up; he was doing laser shows at the Andromeda Club, earning the nickname ‘Laser Larry’ and working the lights at the Hippodrome in Colchester, mixing the likes of Sister Sledge and the Drifters when they passed through. He booked the Rock nights there for a while, opened the Chaplins sandwich bar next door and even tried to unsuccessfully buy the venue at one point.
By 1992 he had moved on and was still gigging, briefly ran both an embroidery business and a dating agency, was once the UK’s sole developer of 3D stereo photographs and a keen practitioner of lenticular animation. He had interests in magic tricks, sci-fi and fantasy, family trees and gadgets of any kind – I’ve never met a man with so many watches and laptops. I only knew him for the final years of his life, tracking him down for my book on projection wheels and interviewing him about his Dr Who Lightshow and Orion Lighting years. After that we became friends and he graciously took part in the launch party, showing off his original wheel art and taking questions all night. He certainly didn’t waste a moment, a keen member of the lighting community and a very unique man.
RIP Lawrence ‘Larry’ Michael Wooden (1950-2025)
The Telepathic Fish party last Sunday was a proper fishing trip down memory lane. Not only for the tunes we played and the old decor we dug up but the people who came from far and wide, some of who we’d not seen in decades. The CDJs and Matt Black‘s AV set up may have been state of the art but the projectors were classic old school with liquid wheels, rotating prisms and op-art FX. The floor was covered with matting, rugs and cushions and our original inflatable ‘amoeba’ was revived, pulsating away in a high corner all night. There were reflective fish hanging from the tunnel walls, David‘s badge-making corner under UV lights that illuminated the flourescent paint of some of our original banners and a jar of free fish sweets to take.
Mario played his first public gig in years, Doug Shipton ably followed with a blend of deep digs into the German end of his collection and I spun multiple decks with a retro set drawing mainly from the early 90s. KiF Productions arrived as doors opened and performed a live soundtrack to their ‘Still Out’ ambient road trip film homage to the KLF and Mixmaster Morris closed with two hours of his usual eclectic brilliance. Below are just some of the highlights – thanks to photographers Mike Sumpter, Nancy Brown, Mario and Larissa Aguera, Chiara Acanfora and Simon Wright for pooling their photos. My short sweep of the room above gives you an example of the every-moving nature of the space.
If you visit Upside Down Records over the summer you’ll be able to see a selection of my design work for Ninja Tune, De:tuned, Castles In Space and more as you browse the racks. The selection comes from some of the work I recently exhibited in Folkestone but concentrates mainly on record-related designs so there’s none of the collage work that I previewed there, I’ll save that for when that project is ready.
The shop deals exclusively in used vinyl with a few racks of CDs and a small selection of vintage cassettes, they also deal in vintage hi-fi so if you’re in the market for a turntable, speakers or an amp, then they might have something for you. If you’ve not visited the shop before then they’re one stop from London Bridge on the overground or a 15 min walk from the heart of Greenwich. They’re open Wednesday-Sunday, check times online. Thanks to shop owner and good friend, Philippe for hosting my work and for the speedy install today.
It’s with great excitement that I can announce the launch party for the Telepathic Fish album in association with Fundamental Frequencies! It’s on August 31st, at a unique venue in Brixton, the home of some of the original parties and keeping a similar vibe.
Mixmaster Morris will of course be gracing the decks, as will Doug Shipton, and myself and original Openmind DJ partner Mario Aguera will also be doing sets. Special guests will be KiF Productions who will DJing the soundtrack to the film of their ‘Chill Out’ homage, ‘STiLL OUT’.
Matt Black will be back on visuals, digging out some period animations for the event and we’ll be dragging a few choice pieces of original Telepathic Fish decor out of storage to give it the feel of the old parties. You’ll have a chance to pick up the album five days early too along with other assorted merch.
Tickets available here:https://ra.co/events/2218194
Omega Auctions have taken on the task of disposing of some of John Peel‘s incredible collection and I can’t think of anyone better. It’s odd seeing objects that I’ve actually held in my hands up for auction and fascinating to see some of the items that I’d not seen when I visited Peel Acres for the Dust & Grooves 2 book – I feel very lucky to have seen it before it was broken up. Here are just some of my favourties from the catalogue, the auction takes place on July 28th.
This has been a long time coming, I’ve been wanting to do something like this for a few years now and at last its time has come. I was approached by Doug Shipton of Finders Keepers / Fundamental Frequencies last year about doing a compilation based around the Telepathic Fish parties I co-founded in the early 90s with Chantal Passamonte (later Mira Calix), Mario Aguera and David Vallade. The four of us shared a house in East Dulwich between 1992-1995 when David and I were in our last year at Camberwell College of Art before leaving to make our way out into the world. What started as a house party grew into a series of ambient events called Telepathic Fish under the name Openmind, an alias I still use to this day for my design work.
Doug’s enthusiasm for the project got Mario, David and I back together (Chantal sadly passed away in 2022) to compile an album of tunes we’d all played and loved at the parties as well as digging in our respective archives for photos, artwork and memorabilia from the time. This was a pivotal era for all of us, a formative intersection before we split and went off in our various directions, and the people we met and partied with remain friends to this day. The double album – Telepathic Fish: Trawling the Early 90s Ambient Underground – includes music from the timeframe above by Caustic Window, Global Communication, Spacetime Continuum, No-Man, Tranquility Bass, Nightmares On Wax, Insides and remixes by The Irrestistible Force, The Orb and David Morley.
It comes in a gatefold sleeve with a 20 page booklet that tells the full Telepathic Fish story and features Mixmaster Morris, Coldcut’s Matt Black, Aphex Twin, Orbital, the Leaf Label’s Tony Morley, the Ambient Soho shop, Megatripolis, The Roundhouse and a disused gas tanker in Amsterdam. All lavishly illustrated with loads of unseen photos and art.
Also available exclusively through Fundamental Frequencies will be a limited bundle that includes a 44 page zine, Mindfood #5 (we also made an ambient fanzine back in the day) that features material from the first 4 issues plus additional unseen ephemera plus a 60 minute mystery mixtape – ‘Float III’ – and an enamel badge of the Telepathic Fish logo too if that kind of thing floats your boat. Pre-order is up now for a release date of September 5th and we’re looking at the prospect of re-enacting the old Fish parties with some of the original participants and decor around that time for a launch party.
It seems things are coming full circle at the moment, what with me supporting The Orb the other weekend. Ambient music is where I first cut my teeth in London as a DJ and these parties were greatly influenced by Mixmaster Morris aka The Irrestistible Force. They were the springboard between college and a career in music and design, where I met Coldcut and in turn ended up jumping on board the Ninja Tune ship for the next three decades. Coinciding with the launch announcement today, Mixmaster Morris, Doug Shipton and I are playing tonight at the Tate Modern Corner bar in London, giving you a flavour of what to expect from the compilation.
It’s seemingly been a month of losses so far and sadly news of another reached me this week, less than two weeks after I’d posted about him for the first time. Doug Lear, formerly one of the UK’s leading exponents of the Magic Lantern (both in performance and collection) passed away on March 6th. Bizarrely, on that very day, I met with friends Neil and Sally Rice who had known him for decades and Neil passed me a red photo album given to him by Doug some years before. Inside this treasure trove is a collection of press cuttings, flyers and other ephemera from his days of giving Magic Lantern performances alongside his then wife, Anita, on their two canal boats.
With Neil’s permission I’m posting some of the contents as a record of their activites in the 80s and 90s, hopefully people will find them along the way and they’ll be useful for research. Also included were four copies of The New Magic Lantern Journal by The Magic Lantern Society from the late seventies / early eighties. This was a reactivated version of an original publication that ran around the late 1800’s to the early 1900’s – several issues of which can be perused on the Internet Archive. I hope you enjoy these pieces of history as much as I do, RIP Doug.
With a growing family, the couple opened a museum, tea room and theatre in Wales in 1991, leaving the boats behind. For more information, see my previous post on the Lears. 
I visited Mick Jones‘ RRPL exhibition at the Farsight Gallery on Friday courtesy of Stephen Coates (seen above at the magazine kiosk inside the venue). For anyone who doesn’t know, Mick is a collector, an understatement when you realise that the amount of ephemera, memorabilia and esoteria on display is possibly only 5% of his archive. Although I can’t claim to be a huge Clash or B.A.D. fan there’s no denying that the collection on display is impressive and wide-ranging. From toys, games, comics, magazines, records, tapes, clothes to art, posters, projection equipment, videos, music gear and pop culture artifacts, it seems there is very little that Mick doesn’t collect.
Primarily of interest to me were his pieces of hip hop ephemera including several by Futura from the early 80s when he and Mick wrote ‘The Escapes of Futura 2000’ with The Clash as backing band. Inside one of the glass cabinets I noticed Futura’s handwritten lyrics to the song, beautifully enscribed in his recognisable style. In another was a customised boombox with drawings by Dondi and Zephyr, a Rammellzee flyer and Beastie Boys tour pass – what a time to be in New York!
Of course there is loads of Clash-related memorabilia too, from equipment to tapes, toys to merchandise, press coverage to what appears to be a Futura-sprayed canvas.
Fanzines were a huge part of the punk movement and there are plenty here although most have been photocopied and pasted up as wallpaper at various points to aid ease of display.
There are also a number of huge colour-themed collages of all manner of ephemera, an ingenious way to display many of the items that were found without an obvious home.
And it goes on and on… there’s even the first in a projected series of magazines devoted to highlights from the collection on sale inside. I highly recommend you try and visit if you’re in the centre of London with an hour or two to spare. It’s free, open daily from midday – 7pm and the gallery is at the end of Denmark St. tucked round the corner by St. Giles church, nearest tube, Tottenham Court Road. Be quick though as it’s only on until March 16th – more info here www.rocknrollpl.com and on Instagram @rocknrollpl
I was lucky enough to be present at this performance, one of the best DJ sets I saw last year. Check Rival Self out, he’s doing great things with records, turntables and samples. Also check Rook Records out in Hackney, one of the best digging spots in London.
This set from Prime Cuts right after is worth your time too.
It’s that time again, time to wrap things up and turn over a new leaf – or just carry on as normal. As is tradition on this blog, here’s some of what’s been floating my boat in 2024, in no particular order. It’s been a good one, very busy but not too busy on the DJ front, that needs some rectifying in 2025, but extremely satisfying on the work and home front. There are still projects that have been in the pipeline that haven’t seen the light of day including a couple of releases I designed in 2023 that are still not out in the wild, at least two audio treats in production and a few things I can’t announce officially yet. I really would like to get some longform music out there in some form in 2025 as I currently have roughly three albums-worth of material sitting on hard drives waiting for some form to be made of them.
Music:
Patrick Carpenter – Electric Envelope (Bandcamp)
Brian Eno – The Lighthouse (Sonos Radio)
Reso – Nut Damage EP (Bandcamp)
Sean Ono Lennon – Asterisms LP (Chimera Music)
Prefuse 73 – New Strategies for Modern Crime (Lex)
Frankie Goes To Hollywood – Welcome To The Pleasuredone (Steven Wilson megamix) (Universal)
The New Library Sound – Library Music Series 02 – Oceanography LP (2 Headed Deer)
Beautify Junkyards – Nova LP (Ghost Box)
Jem Stone – The Legend of Kaptain Karnival (Finger Lickin’/Velocity Press)
Paul Cousins – Oxide Manifesto LP (Castles In Space)
Dave Lombardo – Rites of Percussion LP (Ipecac)
DJ Primecuts feat. MC Conrad – Together / Our Time Is Now 12″ (Self Release)
Magictouch – Kyousoku 2/3 7″ (Delic Records)
LF58 – Radials LP (Astral Industries)
Podcasts:
DjHistory (Bill Brewster)
Oh God, What Now? (Podmasters)
We Buy Records (Tim Scullion / Paul Field)
What Goes Around? (Eamon Murtagh / Deb Grant)
Paper Cuts (Podmasters)
Sound Collage (Achillefs Sourlas)
Not a Diving Podcast with Scuba
Bureau of Lost Culture (Stephen Coates)
Quiet Riot (Alex Andreou / Naomi Smith)
Tales from a Disappearing City (Controlled Weirdness)
The Fanzine Podcast (Tony Fletcher)
Records shops I went to for the first time in 2024 and would recommend:
Tenpin Records, Purley
Rook Records, Hackney
Perfect Lives, Deptford
KillaCutz, Amsterdam
Platypus Records, Amsterdam
Zap Records, Amsterdam
Friendly Records, Bristol
Kingsland Records, Dalston
Crazy Beat Records, Upminster
Bananarama, Antwerp
Grey Records, Antwerp
Decktronix, Rochester
Klang Tone (at their new address), Stroud
Pressing Matters, Hastings
Bear Tree Records, Sheffield
Rob’s Records, Nottingham
FAC1968, Nottingham
B.B.E. Store, Hackney
Off The Record, Haringey
Recycle Vinyl, Dalston
Gigs / Events / Exhibitions:
DEYA Brewery, Cheltenham with Tom Ravenscroft
Light Surgeons’ Takeover @iklectik, London
Baba Yaga’s Hut Takover @iklectik, London
Screenprint24, @Centrespace Gallery, Bristol
Repainting Subway Art @New Walk Gallery, Leicester
Upside Down Records launch, Deptford, London
The New Obsolescents in-store @Wow & Flutter, Hastings
Anne Desmet @guildhall, London
Deliaphonic @Coventry University, Coventry
The Straat Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Seeing the Tulip gardens in the Netherlands
Yoko Ono @ Tate Modern, London
Enzo Mari @ The Design Museum, London
Rise of the Vandals show, York
Grace Jones, Crystal Palace Park, London
Peter Kennard @The Whitechapel Gallery, London
Dele Sosimi Wah Wah 45s 25th anniversary @Village Underground, London
The The @Brixton Academy, London
Taking one of my sons to his first record fairs
Seeing my other son start art college
Levitation’24 – Bedford Esquires, Bedford
The Groovy Record Fayre, @ The Mildmay Club, London
Dust & Grooves Book 2 launch @BBE Store, London
Paul Cousins – Atomized Listening @Stone Nest, London
Prime Cuts, Rival Self and Aroe @Rook Records, London
Electric Dreams @Tate Modern, London
Packaging / Design:
Pye Corner Audio – LP (Ghost Box)
Woo – Robot X LP (Independent Project Records)
Various Artists – Cheeba Issue.1 7″ and Dan Lish comic (Cheeba Cheeba Records)
Drumetrics 10″ record box
Listening Center – Sight and Scene LP (Castles In Space)
Lone Bison – Talk About It / Origin Story 12″ (Castles In Space)
Sculpture – Max Ax 2×10″(LtR Records/Psyche Tropes)
Jo Johnson – Let Go Your Fear LP (Castles In Space)
Beautify Junkyards – Nova LP (Ghost Box)
His Name Is Alive – How Ghosts Affect Relationships 6xLP box set (4AD)
Organic Pulse Ensemble – A Thousand Hands LP (2 Headed Deer)
Jamie XX – In Waves 3xLP (Young)
John Lennon – Mind Games Meditation mixes 3xLP (Universal)
John Lennon – Mind Games Super deluxe box set (Universal)
SD_OA – alla prima cassette (Detroit Underground)
Eilon Paz – Dust & Grooves v1&2 Deluxe Slipcase set
Artists:
Cordula Kagemann
0010×0010
iloobia
Ruben Sutherland
Alex Klim
Lovepusher
MZ Optics
Soda
Ian Bertram
Alex Eckman-Lawn
James Harren
Books / Magazines / Comics:
Judge Dredd: A Better World – Rob Williams, Arthur Wyatt, Henry Flint (2000AD/Rebellion)
Petrol Head book 1 – Rob Williams / Pye Parr (Image)
Bioripple – Nir Levie
Moonray books 1+2 – Brandon Graham / Xurxo G. Penalta
A Decade of Handmade Music Packaging – Time Released Sound
Write Lines – Steve Emery (Velocity Books)
Strange Things Are Happening – Richard Norris (White Rabbit)
Blotter – Erik Davis
Dawn Runner – Ram V / Evan Cagle (Dark Horse)
Precious Metal – Darcy Van Poelgeest / Ian Bertram (Image)
Grommets – Rick Remender / Brett Parson (Image)
Lore Remastered #1 – T.P. Louise / Ashley Wood (Image)
The Sacrificers – Rick Remender / Max Fiumara (Image/Giant Generator)
Ultra Mega – James Harren (Image)
Zerox Machine – Matthew Worley (Reaktion Books)
Dust & Grooves vol.2 – Eilon Paz
Film:
Scala!!!
Dune
Tramps
Furiosa: A Mad Max saga
Eno (version 3.10 + the V&A showing)
Sculpture – ‘Cross Processor’
Another year over and what have I done?
Published a huge piece with Ian Peel about the 40th anniversary ZTT releases
Had my Bonobo zoetrope featured in the Turn On exhibition in Luxembourg
Had a remix of Slim Vic locked grooves featured on the Because We Love Music 24 compilation from Lamour Records
Released a 20th anniversary cassette & T-shirt of my Raiding The 20th Century mix with Delic Records
Contributed to the 45 Live 200 episode with a 7 minute mix plus my annual 1 hr mix
Played the 2nd Candlemas event at the Royal Foundation of St Katherine
Made a CD version of the Future Sound of London’s ‘Pulse Five’ EP for FSOLdigital
Designed the A’bear LP for Castles In Space – out in 2025 hopefully
Designed the Morphology ‘Fractures’ LP, David Morley ‘Fashion’ 12″, Robert Leiner’s ‘Analog Days’ LP, AsOne’s ‘Requiem’ LP and Dan Curtin’s forthcoming LP for De:tuned
Wrote pieces on Andy Votel, Kid Koala, Alex Paterson, Zoe Baxter, DJ Format and Peel Acres for the Dust & Grooves 2 book and website, played at the book launch in London and curated the December You Dig? newsletter
Gave a talk on creative practice at the Confetti industry week in Nottingham
Started a new 2 hr monthly radio show: Electrik Collage on ROVR Radio
Had an in-store performance and LP cover display with The New Obsolescents at Wow & Flutter in Hastings
Played at the Deliaphonic event in Coventry with PuttyRubber and The New Obsolescents
Played in-store with Hannah Brown @ Upside Down, Deptford
Designed the Inside Outside EP and band logo for Dave Barbarossa’s new band, Third House
Contributed to the 40th anniversary release of something that will be announced in 2025…
Played at Levitation’24 alongside Graham Dunning for the Castles In Space all-dayer
Made a 30 min mix for Forsaj’s show on Subtle Radio
Co-compiled an album of early 90s electronica under the Telepathic Fish banner for Fundamental Frequencies, due in 2025
Designed two zoetrope discs for US band, Nile’s ‘Annihilation of the Wicked’ album – out in 2025
Put together The Clerkenwell Kid’s ‘Songs For Crow’ double 3″ CD
Designed an 8″ zoetrope for Acid Lathe featuring two Quadraphon tracks that will be out in 2025
RIP:
John M. Burns, Les McCann, David Soul, Annie Nightingale, Silent Servant, Marlena Shaw, Brian Griffin, Damo Suzuki, Wayne Kramer, Steve Wright, Dan Hillier, Joan Hills, Marian Zazeela, Ed Piskor, Keith LeBlanc, Patti Astor, Trina Robbins, Peter Ceresole, Roger Johnson, MC Duke, MC Conrad, Paul DJ Regal Eve, Duane Eddy, Steve Albini, Roger Corman, Chuck Roberts, James Chance, Donald Sutherland, Bill Viola, Herbie Flowers, James Earl Jones, Larry Todd, Lillian Schwartz, Dave Watts, Quincy Jones, J Saul Kane, Lennie D. Ice, DJ Alfredo, Jimmy Carter.
Looking forward to:
Raiding the 20th Century Expanded version 20th anniversary cassette release 18/01/25
Reactivating my Infinite Iklectik label for some releases
Leigh Bowery exhibition at the Tate Modern
Paul Gorman’s ‘Granny Takes A Trip’ book
The opening of the V&A East Museum
Sophia Satchell-Baeza’s ‘Sensual Laboratories’ book
Concluding the Swan Songs trilogy ?
I’ve been waiting for this day for several years – Dust & Grooves delivery day! Having worked with Eilon Paz over the last few years on parts of this I know the blood, sweat and tears that have gone into just a small portion of it but nothing prepared me for seeing the final product last week at the launch night in London.
The new book is HUGE, it weighs a ton and looks incredible. The attention to detail throughout is beautiful, with spot varnish and embossing on the slipcase of the deluxe edition plus printed insides and a free poster.
The first volume has been re-covered and fits snugly with the second, make no mistake, this is a huge piece of work and will test the strength of any bookcase. I’m extremely proud to have contributed three extensive features to the back half of the book as well as several for the Dust & Grooves website (the Alex Paterson one is already up there with several yet to come that didn’t fit in the book). Interviews with Kid Koala, Andy Votel and Tom Ravenscroft fill pages alongside Eilon’s incredible photography and make this a must for all serious diggers out there.
We’ll never own all these records but we can share in the knowledge and stories behind them via this tome. As you could see from the photos of the launch party in London the other week, it bought together collectors from around the UK with nothing but goodwill and shared enthusiasm. Well done to Eilon and all the editors, designers and proofreaders who helped make this happen. Grab your own copy here
Let’s not the forget the Portables book that Eilon shot alongside the Dust & Grooves volume 2 one! The man’s a machine and this book lovingly catalogues 222 portable turntables – available now, here
I’ll be at the Leicester Print Workshop this weekend, helping Kvist Studio launch her new Fantasy 45’s screen and riso prints as well as new stationary, Buchla and Galt Toys-inspired risos. These are now online in her shop.
There will be loads of other artists selling and exhibiting with an open evening on Friday to start the weekend. Details on the last image. Come down and say hello!
There’s obviously something about the word, ‘groove’ that ticks several boxes for me. My favourite record fair of the year is this Saturday, The Groovy Record Fayre at the Mildmay Club on Newington Green. The record fair is in the day until about 5-6pm then a pub quiz after 7pm followed by a party until 1am – all FREE!
Then on November 19th it’s the UK launch of the Dust & Grooves vol.2 at the BBE Store in Hackney – could this be the line up of the year? Also FREE but you have to RSVP here
More photos found on an old disc; from that time I played at the Supersonic festival in Birmingham alongside The Bug, Coil, LCD Soundsystem, Kid Acne, Req, V/Vm and more. Above, a young Kid Acne, below, Edna soundchecking with Req-1 and Remark (I think?). Req live-painting 12″ sleeves outside and Lucy McLauchlan‘s Beat 13 plane installation. Lastly, The Green Man sculpture by Tawney Gray, just outside the main square where the festival was held.
This year’s Supersonic, now 21 years old, happens at the end of August over 3 days
