Part 1

Name: Harry Towell AKA Glåsbird and Spheruleus
Nationality: British
Occupation: Producer, Whitelabrecs label owner, curator
Current Release: Harry Towell latest Glåsbird album, A Sonic Expedition, is out on Whitelabrecs.
Recommendations: I am really enjoying Vida by Danish artists Halvcirkel at the moment, and SVLBRD's How To Disappear has become part of my nightly routine too.

If you enjoyed this Harry Towell interview and would like to listen to more of his music and the artists on his label's roster, visit the Whitelabrecs official homepage.



When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you're listening? Do you listen with your eyes open or closed?

During the day my eyes are open as I tend to be busy working. Whether this is at the laptop working in my day job or on label administration, or I’ll be listening whilst doing household tasks, gardening, walking the dog etc.

Generally I am always listening to music and when I am, I am also generally on the go doing something! The music helps me through - it will add presence to whatever it is that I am doing and either helps me to concentrate, or in the case of beat-driven or non-ambient music, helps energise me to do something physical.

I am rarely somebody who sits down to give the music my full and undivided attention, and the only time I really do this is when I run listening parties on Bandcamp for my label, Whitelabrecs. These are really special online events that give me a chance to fully experience an album I’ve helped package together with the artist, and I really look forward to this part of releasing music.

At night time and in bed, this is perhaps the only other occasion when I am focusing my attention on the music. I listen exclusively to ambient music to help get me to sleep and before long, my body will shut down as I drift off.

How do listening with headphones and listening through a stereo system change your experience of sound and music?

I have for many years pretty much only listened to music through good quality headphones.

I’d buy physical copies of my favourite records, mostly on vinyl, but my record player (I won’t name and shame here …) is more for show to be honest, to take photos of the vinyl sleeve and post on Instagram. The sound quality is poor and so I’d prefer to listen with headphones on either the Bandcamp app, or dare I say, Spotify. I have somehow been a lover of music for all these years, without really appreciating HiFi.

That’s until this year, when I bought a Cambridge Audio CD player, amp and speakers. I am now able to experience my personal copies of Whitelabrecs CDrs in high quality, and it is a really special feeling. There is a difference between streaming with headphones compared with the ritual of playing a physical object.

I know I have released physical music as the main focus for my label, but strangely I am only just discovering first-hand how it might feel for fans of the label!
 
Tell me about some of the albums or artists that you love specifically for their sound, please.

There are just so many, being a big record collector and someone who is constantly on the hunt for music to connect with. There are a couple of artists that spring to mind in the ambient field. Firstly in modern classical and film soundtrack music, Johann Johannsson is a huge influence and I love how he would build an atmosphere in his work.



In ambient and electronic music, Jason Corder and his work as Offthesky is someone I’ve admired for many years, with his constant innovation and creative use of sound.



Do you experience strong emotional responses towards certain sounds? If so, what kind of sounds are these and do you have an explanation about the reasons for these responses?

I’d say mostly deep extended chords, particularly in minor. Something atmospheric and evocative. Maybe with texture too, such as tape delay, radio static or field recordings. I will always connect with these sorts of sounds.

I also find that I am also able to have a stronger connection with music when there’s a strong visual aesthetic to accompany it, and a concept or back story. This tends to heighten how I receive the sound.
 
There can be sounds which feel highly irritating to us and then there are others we could gladly listen to for hours. Do you have examples for either one or both of these?

Like most, I tend to quickly work out what I’m not enjoying within a relatively short period of time. Perhaps just a few seconds. I’m not keen on happy music and as per the previous question, I enjoy deep minor chords, which is the opposite.

However, I also don’t tend to enjoy darker sounds, and I’m generally not mad on heavily distorted electric guitar in rock or metal music. There are some certain synth sounds I’m not keen on either. But I still respect the artistry behind it all and try to keep an open mind.

I get sent plenty of demos for my label Whitelabrecs, and there’s lots of work that sadly I don’t like personally. But art is subjective, and I respect the creativity and talent behind it. It’s just hard to reply sometimes, because I don’t feel I should be responsible for saying whether something is good or bad. Really, it’s a simple case that it’s not right for me.

Are there everyday places, spaces, or devices which intrigue you by the way they sound? Which are these?

There are a few go-to sounds that I am drawn to when field recording, that I seem to always find interesting. For example, rain seems to have infinite possibilities that depends on where it falls. Then crickets are always great to record too.

When I recorded my album Infinite Light the sound of the environments in and around my home were the central concept and so my ears were open to all possibilities.

There was one summer evening when the rain fell heavily onto the leaves of our oak tree, and this created a series of cascading droplets that hit other leaves as they trickled through. It sounded amazing and it was discovered by simply rushing outside to get the washing in from the clothes line!

Here’s the track Cascading Rain, from Infinite Light:



Have you ever been in spaces with extreme sonic characteristics, such as anechoic chambers or caves? What was the experience like?

Often these experiences crop up when I don’t have my field recorder to hand. I try to be prepared but have missed one or two opportunities!

One time I can recall when I did have my field recorder, was on a visit to Verona with my wife. We went to the Duomo (Cathedral) to take a look round and it had that wonderful natural reverb that I’d often try to recreate virtually using studio plugins. My wife was wearing boots and the sound she made whilst exploring the building slowly was incredible. I recorded it of course, and it features in my Spheruleus track ‘Upward Ears’.



I named that track after the fact that we were both looking up, marvelling at the architecture, whilst I was also marvelling at the wonderful acoustics:
 
What are among your favourite spaces to record and play your music?

I’d say the outdoors would be my favourite place to record.

My home doesn’t have any particularly interesting acoustic properties that might make it stand out from anywhere else. So the most interesting opportunities are likely to be field trips, usually outdoors.
 
Do music and sound feel “material” to you? Does working with sound feel like you're sculpting or shaping something?

I certainly agree with the notion of sound as a material, and sculpting it is exactly the term I think of when creating music. I am not able to read music or play instruments properly, but I am able to work with sound nevertheless, shaping different sound sources together into a composition.

When I write modern classical music, I am however thinking more of the composition and tend to be influenced by more traditional orchestral performance when I’m making the arrangements. It’s when I’m creating ambient music where things feel more free and fluid, and in particular, this feels like an exercise in sound sculpture.

Then combining both classical instrument textures with an ambient approach really does feel special - an example of how I approach this is here in this track I made as Glåsbird, called Arktiskul: