New solo album

My latest album, Swarm Logic, has just been released. It is available via Bandcamp in digital form, and in a very limited physical edition of 25 only.

 

 

Collaborative album on Fort Evil Fruit

 

An album with David Lacey, Magnetic North, was recently released by Irish cassette label Fort Evil Fruit

Fergus Kelly: bowed bass, bowed cymbals, no-input mixer, bowed steel rods, found metals, electro-magnetic recordings, bowed car suspension springs, aeolian harp, spinning top, Gamelan Kjai Jati Roso, bowed singing bowl, mic/speaker feedback, whirly, Bow Gamelan Ensemble pyrophones (from Kelly’s recording of ‘In C And Air’, ICA, London, 6.8.86 – used with kind permission),
composition and mix.

David Lacey: snare, gongs.

Composed in Dublin 2022 - 2023.

Photo by Fergus Kelly. 

 

"From Fergus Kelly, I reviewed various works over the years. He's a percussion player, creating his own instruments and working with electronics. He has recorded with Max Eastley, Mark Wastell and Bruno Duplant and now has a new recording with David Lacey, also a percussionist and someone whose work is reviewed occasionally in Vital Weekly. Kelly and Lacey worked together before (see Vital Weekly 1010). 

 

They have a single piece here, 41'14" long, and spread out over the two sides of the cassette. Kelly plays a variety of instruments, "bowed bass, bowed cymbals, no-input mixer, bowed steel rods, found metals, Gamelan Kjai Jati Roso, electro-magnetic recordings, bowed car suspension springs, aeolian harp, spinning top, bowed singing bowl, mic/speaker feedback, whirly, Bow Gamelan Ensemble pyrophones" while Lacey plays the snare and gongs. 

 

The snare roll is the primary feature of the music, as it is heard throughout this piece, swelling and fading but a presence nonetheless. Kelly uses that adds his blend of percussion and electronics, which effectively makes the various movements this piece goes through. These rolls indicate the start of multiple sections in each new section, so Kelly rearranges his set-up and plays his dark material into this. 

 

I don't think this is a gathering of two persons in one room, recording it all in one take, but rather meticulous, mixing various parts. Lots of sustaining sounds from the gong, but also from the uses of bows upon snares, cymbals and gong. Moody and dark music, an excellent work that keeps moving, like the snare rolls, rocking back and forth. Quite intense music, certainly at a loud volume, but it makes the immersion complete." 

 

Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly

 

New album

 My latest album, Bunker Emissions has just been released. It is available via Bandcamp in digital form only.

 

 

Book of drawings

Room Temperature is very proud to announce its first printed publication in the form of a 36 page book of recent drawings, Imaginary Geographies in a limited edition of 50 only. This is a collection of 10 drawings made between 2019 and 2021. The book contains a 4,000 word essay, Metallic Blue Turned Red With Rust (only available in printed form) and 20 archive photos of Dublin in the 90s.

 

Everybody Hears The Hum At 3am

 

I recently wrote an essay for A Sound Map Of Dunloaghaire, Everybody Hears The Hum At 3am - Sound Marks, Memory Prompts and Possible Futures, reflecting on the sonic landmarks and associated memories of my younger days.

New album

My latest album, Plate Spinning, has just been released. It is available via Bandcamp in digital form, and in a very limited physical edition of 25 only.

Dirty Blue Cheeseburger

I've put together a playlist of all the 139 song fragments used in my recent post-punk tribute, Dirt Behind The Daydream. It was fun putting the piece together (lots of work too, of course - best part of a month in total). Only a fraction of the over 1500 edits were used in the final piece. Some only about a second long.. I think I did manage to capture that post-punk spirit of experimentation and DIY.

Like the other tributes, some unintentionally uncanny moments: after The Fall's Mark E. Smith says "Friday.." early in the piece, I realised that the Associates song just before it was called Tell Me Easter's On Friday... The Fall track is called Gramme Friday. Various melodies from different songs coalescing in surprisingly tuneful ways.. especially when a moment of Joy Division's 24 Hours is superimposed with The Fall's Kicker Conspiracy - Hooky's bass harmonising with Hanley's ! Hugo Burnham's muscular, inventive drumming on Gang Of Four's Cheeseburger accompanied by Captain Beefheart's Dirty Blue Gene is another favourite among too many to mention.

Initial notes/ideas Nov/Dec 2020

Edit list with working title, Post-Punk Pearls, Jan 2021.

PLAYLIST:

23 Skidoo:

Porno Bass
Mary's Operation
Vegas El Bandito
Quiet Pillage
Last Words

A Certain Ratio:

Abracadubra
Waterline

Associates:

Kitchen Person
Tell Me Easter's On Friday
The Associate

Au Pairs:

Set Up
Pretty Boys
Headache For Michelle
Love Song
Unfinished Business

Black Uhuru:

Shine Eye Gal

Buzzcocks:

No Reply
Nothing Left

Captain Beefheart:

Dirty Blue Gene
Best Batch Yet
Run Paint Run Run
Sue Egypt
Hot Head
Sheriff Of Hong Kong

Cabaret Voltaire:

Silent Command
A Thousand Ways
Red Mask
Touch Of Evil
Jazz The Glass
Landslide

Clash:

Janie Jones
Career Opportunities

DNA:

Lying On The Sofa Of Life
32123

Dome:

Cruel When Complete
Breathsteps
The Red Tent

Ian Dury:

Sweet Gene Vincent
Blackmail Man
If I Was With A Woman
My Old Man
Reasons To Be Cheerful
Clevor Trever
What A Waste
Inbetweenies
Blockheads
Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll

Eyeless In Gaza:

Three Kittens
Dreaming At Rain
Before You Go


The Fall:

Frightened
Gramme Friday
Music Scene
Live At The Witch Trials
Two Steps Back
US 80s-90s
Kicker Conspiracy

Flying Lizards:

Another Story
Cirrus

Gang Of Four:

Cheeseburger
Not Great Men
If I Could Keep It For Myself
Glass
Ether
Paralyzed
Anthrax

Bruce Gilbert/Graham Lewis/Russell Mills:

Extracts from MZUI album

Joy Division:

The Only Mistake
Atrocity Exhibition
Wilderness
Day Of The Lords
New Dawn Fades
Autosuggestion
Isolation
24 Hours
Disorder

Ludus:

The Escape Artist
Unveil
Box
Sightseeing

Magazine:

The Light Pours Out Of Me
My Tulpa
Feed The Enemy
Cut-Out Shapes
The Thin Air
Stuck
Because You're Frightened

Pere Ubu:

The Modern Dance
Life Stinks
Heart Of Darkness
Over My Head
Sentimental Journey
Non-Alignment Pact

PiL:

Theme
Bad Baby
Annalisa
The Suit

Pop Group:

Trap
There Are No Spectators
Don't Call Me Pain
Don't Sell Your Dreams
Thief Of Fire
Blind Faith
Amnesty Report
She Is Beyond Good And Evil
How Much Longer

Rip, Rig & Panic:

Need (De School You)
Those Eskimo Women Speak Frankly

Slits:

Newtown
Ping Pong Affair
Instant Hit
Shoplifting

Steel Pulse:

Handsworth Revolution

Stephen Mallinder:

Temperature Drop

Talking Heads:

Warning Sign
I Zimbra
Drugs
Stay Hungry

Television:

Marquee Moon

This Heat:

Triumph

Horizontal Hold
Music Like Escaping Gas
Independence
24 Track Loop
Paper Hats
A New Kind Of Water

Ultravox:

Saturday Night In The City Of The Dead
Distant Smile

Virgin Prunes:

Sandpaper Lullaby
Abigail
Sad World
No Birds To Fly

Wire:

12XU
Former Airline
Once Is Enough
Mercy
Reuters
Too Late

White Noise In My Old Man's White Room

It's a no-man's land in the Forbidden City