fear – Hannah Nicklin

: horrifically obsolete media format

Although I do sometimes post about music on here (my traditional Music Wot I Liked This Year post is coming soon, fear (not)), I’ve not really put stuff on here very often, I recommend lots on more stream-based platforms, but it just didn’t seem like the right place for it here. And anyway, who am I to talk about something that I don’t/can’t make? How could I possibly have an informed opinion on it? Or so my thoughts ran, until recently, the past year or so I’ve been really really getting into music, way deeper than before. A combination of bandcamp, as both discovery mechanism and pwyc pricing, and buying a RECORD PLAYER (I also got my ‘I’m a dick who covets obselete formats’ card at the same time) has meant a different, deeper, and much more varied listening. I started following zines, going to way more gigs, and then when the brilliant UK emo folk at Zine & Not Heard put out a call for reviewers, I nervously shuffled forward. One of those thing I do, sometimes. Don’t know why. ‘Yeah I’ll jump off a 5m diving board for the first time in front of a photographer from a local newspaper‘, ‘yeah I’ll put on a semi-regular night of performance and compere, market, promote, tech and fund it‘, that kind of thing.

However I was really properly nervous about writing about music, for several reasons: I am confidently able to say I am ZERO musical and because I don’t make, I don’t feel like I can listen ‘properly’ and use all the right language to describe stuff; because this level of music ‘scene’ is around about ‘stamp collector’ or ‘birder’ levels of intricate specialist knowledge and I have little memory for names of stuff (I describe all albums/books as ‘you know, it’s petrol blue and it’s got that big sort of slightly dystopian skyscraper thing on the front sort of like the future from the early 00s’*); and finally, because I am a girl, and as XKCD illustrates when you do stuff ‘not typical girl’ and are seen to fail, you are evidence of the lack of capability of ALL GIRLS. Who wants to bear that?

But then I tend to try and do the things that scare me. That’s what makes fear useful, I think, being able to identify what’s at stake, and if it’s worth sticking it out.

So I did start writing for Zine & Not Heard. I’ve done four reviews so far, for Innards, the new We Were Skeletons, Carson Well’s Wonderkid, and the forthcoming EP from Moose Blood. And I found a way of doing it. A way of using words (that I do know how to use) to talk about the stuff I don’t. I dunno if people can tell it feels different for me… I particularly really struggle with the FFO bit – not remembering names thing kills me there. And I worry I don’t know enough other bands to be less than predictable in that bit… but then I had a mini epiphany, and I decided to think about it in the way I learnt to think about academia – sure I don’t know all the books you’ve read, but I know all the ones I have, and it’s likely you’ve not read all of them too – this begins to get interesting, begins to be a culture, an art when we bring them together. And when I stopped worrying about that, and started to listen to the music to write about in a way that was from me, I started to really really enjoy it. It’s a properly rewarding way of listening, like from a different direction than I’m used to. Like a way, in fact, I think I’m used to looking at a piece of theatre, suddenly the music felt much more visual, I saw patterns, I heard words, I saw the layers pull out in front of me. I probably miss lots. I probably dwell on the lyrics too much. I’ve got lots to learn (always, always) and it does make me anxious, but in a really rewarding kind of way. So that’s a thing that I’m doing at the moment.

So, yeah, if you’re interesting in reading what I write over there, head here. But read the other stuff too. They’re all good.

*points for naming the album. The first band I saw live, in fact.

Hurrah! The final instalment on the 7 installations and things that I made as part of Northern Big Board. You can find part one here, and part two over here. Today, a little about Cuppa. Trust Me, and the BONUS CONTENT. Let’s get straight into it…

CUPPA

Cuppa was made in response to the importance of the cafe to the pool building – to making it a place people stay, rather than justa place people go. As part of the cuts and restructures the pool was undergoing the cafe had had its hours drastically cut.
This meant that not only was it not open much of the time, but that people were never certain whether it might be – people stopped wandering up on the off chance. A reasonable amount of the families and older visitors to the pool talked sadly about this, and so I wanted to make a piece that reflected that meeting place. Hence, Cuppa. Cuppa was a piece for two participants, with a part a and part b. It involved a tea set with real (Yorkshire) tea and a single biscuit. It was a synchronous piece of audio that asked two participants to move together – not always in unison, some times differently, thinking on their own, or moving to compliment the other – two sides of the same experience. It was a requiem to the closing cafe. To those places of accidental crossing, weak tea, and chip butties. You can, if you want to see how the two parts worked together, read the script here. The aim was for it to be quiet and gentle and a small space for two people to come together.

TRUST ME

This was the ‘big’ piece for me, I don’t necessarily think it was for the people who experienced the installations, it was focal in that way, but it was really important for me. For several reasons, first that it was the hardest to write, by far, second (and relatedly) it was the one I felt the least prepared to, and most want to do justice to – because it was about diving, and finally, because it was the one (I felt) that linked up most strongly with everything Emma was saying in her play for the project. Throughout the 6 weeks I had been learning to dive with the help of a brilliant coach and diver called Dave Cowen. Bradford Esprit diving had worked with Northern Big Board to set up the ‘big board amnesty’ every Friday – where members of the public could turn up and have a go at diving, maybe even take a leap off the 5m board. That experience of learning to dive was one of the most brilliant and rewarding things I’ve done in recent years. I do quite a bit of sport, but it’d been a while since I learnt something, and I love learning things. I additionally loved learning something physical, of working with (as opposed to despite my tired) body, of pushing myself past fear. Incredibly rewarding, a proper rush, and something really important about learning by doing, and working with, rather than against, failure. With Trust Me, I tried to approach these things. So Trust Me is a piece about facing your fears. About how fear is natural failure useful, and the most important things being willing to try again. It’s also a piece about diving. It emerged out of a conversation I recorded with Dave. The love in his voice as he spoke about the sport was unmistakable. He said after the interview that Shipley Pool was his first pool, “It’s like your first love, you never forget it”. That’s what this piece was about. Trust, failure, the love of being better. The piece itself took place in a dark enclosed space with a semi-transparent curtain/screen directly infront of you. A video projected water onto the floor. Participants entered to find a bench, and are throughout the piece invited to come towards a platform (obscured) in the centre of the room, urged to take steps towards giving up their fears, to find the best of themselves. There’s a slideshow of pictures below. And because I’m feeling generous, an embed of the audio.

listen to ‘Trust Me’ on Audioboo

The final piece I made was a bonus track of sorts. To encourage people to explore as much as possible I introduced a simple little collection mechanic – after each installation you could collect a token, and with 3 or more exchange it for a URL of a download, or if you didn’t have access to the internet, the piece on a CD. It was a simple little audio montage of all the voices I’d gathered from the pool, just under three minute. I also made this available to all the staff, who shared it with everyone they could. I was really proud to begin to represent the story of their place to them.

This whole project was very hard, but the majority of that burden was right for me to feel. It was a privilege. A real privilege, to listen to and attempt to tell the stories of these people.

Tag: fear

On learning to know I don’t know.

Northern Big Board – What I did part 3