Other Audio Obscura
The Corner of Red Lion Street and Cromer Road, Aylsham / Disquiet Project 0231

Background / Setting:
As has been the case before with me, I read the Disquiet Junto email just after I put my son to bed and had some free time, the email for the challenge came earlier this week so I started it more or less straight away this evening, I was determined to do it this week regardless of what it is as I have been busy the last few weeks and not took part. I live in the middle of nowhere in Norfolk, in the UK, I have nothing around me except fields but wanted a bit of activity for the recording part of challenge so I drove to the market square in my nearby country town of Aylsham to record this, I needed to nip to the Co-op for a few bits and pieces anyway. I walked around the back of the Church, it was 7.20 / 7.40pm when I recorded this, a bit windy this evening but I found a sheltered enough spot. The birds were making a constant chatter as it was nearing roosting time and there a lot of trees by the church but I kept the mics on the 'close setting' as I feared they would take up too much noise if I opened the mics outwards. There is a road here where I recorded which gets a bit of traffic as it comes through the town and has a junction about 20 or so meters away. I set my Tascam device recording and sat on a wooden bench a meter or two away and made notes as things happened. Not much happened really just cars going past and the birds roosting. I recorded 20 minutes and then went home with my notes and loaded it into my computer. I listened through once and it was quite obvious to me which minute to use...

68 second Field Recording: This section I have used is by far the most exciting 60 or so seconds; after about 14/15 seconds a motorbike comes past, he revs the engine after about 20 seconds. Then some teenage kids come around the corner and you get a bit of talk - to be honest I never paid them much attention at the time - 'kids walk past talking 5-10 seconds' is all I wrote in the notes. The traffic gets a busier between 30 and 40 seconds. After 41 seconds there is a strange bird sound. The wind makes something close to the mic make a sound at 1.06 and I fade it out here.
I put the recording into Ableton, and trimmed it to 68 seconds and then I went and got a beer from the fridge and loaded the dishwasher for 10 minutes or so thinking about what to do next.

Additional Synth Sounds, improvised in one take:
I started playing a nice ambient synth sound in Ableton, my notes from the field recording dictated what I played. I told myself to move my fingers about a bit after 14 seconds and again something a bit more radical at 20 seconds when the motorbike would rev sound would happen - this is the ringing sort of mellow bell tone. Again do something when the interesting birds squeaking happens after 41 seconds - I was a second or so late but you can hear my response to this, its the organ sort of improvised bit which fades as the minute mark approaches.
That was it really. I sat and mastered and mixed it only roughly - I liked the feel of it though. It now 9.30pm and I posting it now, so that was a fun two hours!

I forgot to take my camera or phone with me but I found this image picture online, its fairly close to where I recorded, I was just the other side of the gate on the right hand side!

Disquiet Junto Project 0231: Field Complement
The Assignment: Compose a piece to align with, from memory, 60 seconds of everyday sound.

This week’s project’s theme involves how composing relates to memory. It is recommended that you read through all the steps in the project before proceeding to attempt to execute it.