The roots of this website are rooted in the Word Magazine blog/The Word Massive. Loads of that original online community have dropped away over the years and gone to Twitter or elsewhere and I’m wondering how strong that connection with Word Magazine and The Afterword still is, particularly given that David Hepworth and Mark Ellen have been very active during the past year with Word In Your Ear. In the early days of this website I got the distinct impression the ex-Word writers wanted nothing to do with it and apart from Mark joining in for a podcast there was very little interaction, and when WIYE got going it certainly didn’t have any connection to this site as I can tell. I don’t post or follow this “Forum” (ffs) so much these days so I wonder if there are many of us from the Word blog days left. Are any Afterworders on the WIYE Patreon? Have any of you paid to have Mark and Dave interview you on your Birthday?!
I want a Word with you!
I’m all for experimental music and things that a lot of people will witheringly call ‘pretentious’. I own a 17 CD Henry Cow Box set. I listen to Autechre’s NTS Sessions a lot. I own a copy of STUMM433 (Google it). This, however is pure Nathan Barley. Released by Johnny Trunk, inspired by his neighbour who goes by the name of Futurecrime (of course). Apparently this is ASMR and people “get off on it”. I quote: “If one weren’t told otherwise, the recordings may well resemble close-miked documentation of insects, some esoteric ritual, or a game of backgammon sped up, but closer inspection reveals sequences of these flurries that are possibly identifiable as furious delete keying or hammering a return button. And this is where it gets interesting, as each recording reveals to the listener the idiosyncrasies of each keyboard and its custom parts which, like custom built cars, use a huge spectra of parts both vintage and bespoke to achieve the users’ dream build and preferred levels of tactility and clickiness.”
