“… Shaughnessy’s book is not an act of mourning for a lost era of great cover art, but a celebration of those labels whose designs have thrived in the digital era. Foremost amongst these are Touch and Ghost Box. The identity of these labels has been defined by their cover designers, Jon Wozencroft and Julian House. Touch began in the early ‘80s, but its tactile aesthetic – it conceived of itself as an ‘audio-visual’ label – meant that it was never going to succumb to the digital tendency towards decoupling sound from images. Wozencroft’s cover photographs – austerely, impersonally beautiful shots – do not so much illustrate the music of Touch artists such as Fennesz, Oren Ambarchi and Philip Jeck as they set a tone for how it can be heard. …”

Click here to read the full review online at frieze.com

Atmospheres 2 takes place at The Museum of Garden History in London, from May 8th to May 12th 2008. You can read about this in The Guardian and a preview in The Londonist here

May 8th
Alex Metcalf – Tree Listening
2030 Marcus Davidson
2050 Philip Jeck & Marcus Davidson
2115 Robert Hampson
2200 Philip Jeck
A review of the first day’s events can be read in The Londonist

May 9th
2030 Matt Davies & Simon Whetham
2110 Charles Matthews followed by Fennesz & Charles Matthews
2200 Fennesz
A review of the second day’s events can be read in The Londonist

May 12th
Hauntology:
presented by Jon Wozencroft and Mark Fisher
11.00 Opening of the event/doors
11.30 Introduction by Jon Wozencroft & Mark Fisher
11.45 Mark Fisher, Hauntology Now – you can read the text from this presentation here
12.30 Paul Devereux, Landscape and Perception
1.15 Lunch
2.15 Christopher Woodward, The End of London
3.00 Jon Wozencroft, Up the Ladder towards the Roof
3.45 Steve Goodman, Stone Tape
4.30 Open Forum
[6.00 – 7.30 Soundchecks]
8.15 The Caretaker
8.45 Kode 9 & The Spaceape
9.45 The Caretaker
10.00 Philip Jeck

Pics by Sheikh Ahmed (failme.net) can be found here

“This is what we’ve been waiting for – the chance to finally present the epic Touch catalogue in digital format. The UK label has long been a favourite of ours and it’s hardly surprising with the sheer volume of quality releases, they almost seem infallible even, with rarely a dud record emerging from their hallowed company. Established in 1981 and adorned with some of the most gorgeous cover-art ever to grace a sleeve, Touch became widely known for its look, fashioned in part by the photography of Jon Wozencroft (who co-runs the label). These simple but devastatingly effective images became synonymous with their respective releases and the label became just as widely appreciated in the art world as in the world of experimental music. It’s the music itself though that has set Touch apart from so many other similar labels, and their roster still speaks for itself; Fennesz, Biosphere, Hafler Trio, Oren Ambarchi, Philip Jeck, Rosy Parlane, Jóhann Jóhannsson, BJ Nilsen, Chris Watson, Mika Vainio, Ryoji Ikeda – it reads like a veritable who’s who of contemporary experimental music. Many of these artists seem to have gravitated towards Touch to create their finest works – Fennesz with the seminal ‘Venice’ or Oren Ambarchi with the genre-bending ‘Grapes From the estate’ whereas others simply found a home they could grow with over many albums; Philip Jeck and Chris Watson for instance, but it is to Touch’s credit that they have managed to build a team of worldwide recording artists this flawless. To conclude, the Touch catalogue is a selection of work we have deep respect for and somehow manage to keep going back to again and again, it’s just that good. Take the time to explore deeper and you won’t be disappointed…”

You can visit the Boomkat website here.

In February & March 2008, an event at Norwich Arts Centre, Norfolk, ‘DIY’, portrayed some of Jon Wozencroft’s Touch cover art. Here are 3 photos from the exhibition, which “explored the contemporary infrastructure for self-promotion and the appeal of the hand-made object.”

Date: Wednesday 09.04.2008 19:00
Location: Cabaret Voltaire, Spiegelgasse 1, 8001 Zurich.
contact email fo reservations etc: info@cabaretvoltaire.ch / +41 43 268 57 20
website: www.cabaretvoltaire.ch
you can find an announcement in German here

Programme
1900 Chris Watson presents…
1945 Mike Harding Presents Touch
2030 Chris Watson Live

atmospheres 2 takes place at The Museum of Garden History in London, from May 8th to May 12th 2008, with an introductory talk on March 13th [Royal College of Art, Jay Mews, London SW1]

An introduction to Hauntology. A sound seminar by Jon Wozencroft
6pm, Performing Arts Lab, Stevens Building

If you consider everything from self-help books to the philosophy of Adorno, it is clear that the driving pattern of the moment is towards personal reinvention. What is “faith in the future”? An early Easter celebration. All welcome!

Sunday April 6th 2008
@ Ghost Club
Catch, 22 Kingsland Rd, Shoreditch, London E2 8DA, UK

Rosy Parlane plays a rare London date after his live appearance at the Qwartz Awards in Paris on April 4th

Touch has entries in 12 nominations for the Qwartz Awards 2008 and will be appearing live for these awards. A special edition of Touch Tone 25 has been manufactured for this event, with the kind permission of the artists.

April 3rd: Black venue: Maison des Métallos, rue Jean-Pierre Timbaud, Paris 75011 (Metro Couronne).

Rosy Parlane | Fennesz

April 4th: Cirque d’Hiver Bouglione: 110 rue Amelot, Paris 75003 (Metro Filles du Calvaire). 1 hour after Blixa Bargeld, Max Mathews, Jean-Claude Risset and Beatriz Feyrrera [Qwartz d辿onneur attributions] from 23h to 1h30, with Radio France [France Musique] direct retransmission, Qwartz’s official sponsor.

Chris Watson | Philip Jeck | BJNilsen

Free entrance

Whispering in the Leaves

A major new sound installation at Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens
Presented as part of AV Festival 08: 29th February – 9th March 2008
Artists’ Talk & Desert Island TV: Sat 8 Mar, 2.30 -3.30pm

Chris Watson discusses his new work Whispering in the Leaves. The talk will be followed by Desert Island TV, where Chris will introduce and screen BBC nature documentary the Life of Birds made with David Attenborough.

For AV Festival 08, Watson has created a powerful new sound work derived from his extensive archive of wildlife and on location recordings in Central and South America – habitats that host over half of the planet’s wildlife. Diffused through the tropical foliage of the enclosed botanical environment of the Winter Gardens, which is home to over 2,000 flowers and plants, the surround soundtrack of wildlife dawn and dusk choruses will be transmitted at hourly intervals throughout the day for 15-20 minute durations – the approximate time taken in the rainforest for the transitions from darkness into light, and from daylight to dark. The sound pieces feature the calls and voices of thousands of species, including the howls and shrieks of black howler and spider monkeys, the musicality of diverse birdsong and the shimmering and hissing of tree frogs and cicadas. A highly sensory and captivating experience, Whispering in the Leaves is a remarkable demonstration of the power of sound recordings and natural history broadcast to transport us to far flung, inaccessible and often extraordinary locations.

LISTINGS INFORMATION

Venue: Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens, Burdon Road, Sunderland, SR1 1PP
Free entry, opening hours: Mon – Sat 10am – 5pm, Sun 2pm – 5pm.
T: 0191 553 2323 / W: www.twmuseums.org.uk/sunderland
Installation: Fri 29 Feb – Sun 9 Mar 08
Live performance: Thurs 6 Mar 08, 8.30 – 9.00pm
FREE but limited capacity to register your interest contact info@avfestival.co.uk
A full press release can be downloaded here
[photo: Sean Thamer]

A full pdf of this info can be downloaded here

Touch is providing the music for the elevators in the Lloyd Hotel. Here is the track listing:

AER – As I Wander Round
BIOSPHERE – Moistened & Dried
RAFAEL TORAL – Desiré
BJNILSEN – Götland
ROSY PARLANE – Iris part 3
CHRIS WATSON – Sunsets. Breachacha, Island Of Coll, Scotland
BRUCE GILBERT – Sliding Off The World
GEIR JENSSEN – Tingri The Last Truck

Storm – Live in Bergen
Chris Watson ｬ BJNilsen
Bergen Kino
4.12.07 MB1

18:30 Chris Watson & BJNilsen perform live their soundtrack to the film by Ole Mads Vevle ‘Tanakh Bibelen Al-Quran’
18:45 Storm

Readers viewers & listeners will have noticed that the 25 year anniversary celebrations have lasted well beyond their alloted timespan. Maybe it is our response to a time-based conundrum, to further the question concerning what we are doing with our time.
These two texts were written in close proximity to the Touch 25 CD released in February 2006, and having got somewhat lost in cyberspace, are here re-presented in their unedited form.

The first was a commission by Computer Arts magazine, published in June 2006 though written a few months earlier. The second, “Digital Glass”, was written for the London College of Communication site ‘Limited Language’, both forming part of a work in progress called “On/Off”. [Jon Wozencroft, 28th November 2007]

The Moon Is Down
Digital Glass

‘Weather Report’ is named in The Guardian’s ‘1000 Albums to Hear Before You Die’ List…

Chris Watson is one of the world’s leading recorders of wildlife and natural phenomena, and here he edits his field recordings into a filmic narrative. The unearthly groaning of ice in an Icelandic glacier is a classic example of, in Watson’s words, putting a microphone where you can’t put your ears.

Instinct (ITV), for which Touch did the music design, won a RTS NW award for Best Single Drama or Drama Serial on Saturday 18th November at The Hilton, Manchester

The Ghost Train by Chris Watson
The British Library
16.11.07

Take the ghost train across Mexico, coast to coast, Pacific to Atlantic, Los Mochis to Veracruz. Ride the rhythm of the rails on an acoustic journey that has now passed into history. Travel through the heart of Mexico on board the most exciting, beautiful and dynamic feat of engineering that this country has ever seen.

The Ghost Train celebrates the sounds of a project that fuelled a revolution. [Chris Watson, September 2007]

Touch has been nominated for Label of the Year by French organisation, Qwartz. Marhaug | Asheim – Grand Mutation has been nominated for Album of the Year, and Chris Watson ｬ BJNilsen – Storm for Experimental/Research project.

You can vote for your nominations from November 5th here

Here you can fine a review and photos of the recent Touch 25 event and for the atmospheres festival here

The Londonist have reviewed the event here

Touch follows up its 25th anniversary event of 2006 with a final show featuring:
Chris Watson | BJNilsen | Biosphere | People Like Us
+ special guests Zerocrop & Autodigest

Order of events:

2015 Chris Watson
2045 People Like Us
2100 BJNilsen
2145 People Like Us
2200 Zerocrop
2215 Touch 25
2245 Biosphere
2330 Autodigest
2345 People Like Us