New EP from Head Noise: Where next Einstein?

The new EP distills our current fears and phobias about the future, our inherent mistrust of technology and the hope of redemption through personal change. Layers of distorted treated electric guitars shimmer throughout, with ethereal noise loops and spoken word samples from Albert Einstein.

This three track EP is an extension of previous Head Noise work, which Hot Press has described as "interesting and unconventional" and the Milk Factory as a music of "twisted sonic landscapes somewhere between minimal post-rock and dub electronica in its most somber form, creating dense atmospheric structures [...]."

The new EP continues in that vein - the final track being a change in mood with the captivating "Blues for Govinda" - comprising of a simple but haunting guitar motif merging with gentle strings and horns, organ sounds and other esoteric tunings also offset the piece.

The EP is designed to be listened to as a continuous gapless piece, so it is best to download all three tracks and import into iTunes or similar.

Feel the noise... download the new Head Noise EP "Where next Einstein?".

My Favourite Weirdo EP

Lovely fuzzy bleeps, sqeaks, layered guitars, loops, squalks, rhythms, beats and blues for the Weird Age we find ourselves in.

Layers of ambient sounds, repetative beats make the "My Favourite Weirdo EP" electronica with a heart.

Taking inspiration from sources as diverse as the works of G.K. CHesterton, C.S. Lewis and Aphex Twin, the new EP brings thoughtfullness to evolving ambient soundscapes and beats that capture the spirit of retro electronica.

Josh notes: For the recording Ableton Live 7 was used, along with treated guitar snippets fed into an Akai Headrush. The Headrush allowed me to nicely build some interesting snippets of guitar generated glitches into evolving patterns that were sequenced in Ableton Live with other sounds from my Korg Triton (my studio workhorse). Many of the tracks are nicely synchopated etc except the third track "Wobble". This track is contrary and deliberately well, wobbly. It shifts in and out of time, and admittedlty sometimes this works, and other times it just doesn't.. but this is ok. I liked this kind of sound and the way sometimes the rythm leads and sometimes it's the bass and sometimes - well I'm not too sure what is doing what :-)

For a limited time you will be able to download the "My Favourite Weirdo EP" from here.

Postcards from the Hedge by Joshue O Connor (2008)

To try and figure out my life I needed some useful imagery. I figured that my life is a lot like my relationship with plants and nature, some may say that is a lazy metaphor, a cliché. I don’t really care. Even if truth becomes hackneyed and worn, it is still truth. Rather like Chauncey Gardiner, in Hal Ashby’s brilliant ‘Being There’, he played the part of a man who was a childlike cipher for things that may or may not be true, and people were so empty they saw something in him that filled their own need. So I think, the hedge is a good metaphor, and in this context it represents the world or my perception of that world. As Bishop George Berkeley postulated “The world is in the mind, not the mind in the world”.

My life has also been a winding and rather spiral type affair, non-linear, lateral.. so now as an aging Punk Rock Hippy.. I am now settled for the first time in my life. More happy in my skin than I have ever been and this album is both a look back and a look inwards, over the years that have brought me here.

So back to the hedge, after spending many years either under the hedge, out of the hedge, fighting with the hedge, living at the hedge, and now in general trimming the hedge - here are some songs about my experiences.

The album ‘Postcards from the Hedge’ is about many things. The search for identity and the divine. Madness, alienation, finding love, as well as travel and cows.

It has taken nearly 15 years for some of these songs to finally see the light of day. I do hope some of them resonate with you in someway. They catalogue my journey and an honest and genuine desire to figure out life, or at least my small place in it, and deal with some of the big questions. I don’t care how daft and uncool it is to say that out loud, but I am not a very complex man, so why not be clear and voice what I think in a simple manner?

The quest for identity and meaning is a valuable one and in many ways the most important journey we shall ever undertake. Without it we are nothing more than rocks lost at the foot of the mountain, seeds on the breeze or empty ciphers transfixed and hypnotised by pretty pictures beamed into our home. Oh dear.

I am not interested in shallow and superficial appraisals of what this record is or is not, and in a sense I am not really concerned about how this record is received, as I kinda made it for myself. I feel now like I have been freed somewhat and can move on and explore other things. Making this record has been like giving birth to a small talented elephant or like watching a mountain rise a couple of millimeters a year.

As a result of all that, I am vainly presenting the songs to you for a listen if you care to take a glimpse inside a strangers head.

Many thanks to Robert Waterhouse for his great double bass playing on many of these tracks. I play all of the guitar, drums and some bass and it's me doign the dodgy warbling throughout (and some of it is truly dodgy). Also big thanks to Alun Smyth who engineered and helped me produce the record.

This album is dedicated to my friend Aodhan O Gormain who has sadly left us for a higher world and we are wanting in his absence. Slan go foil a chara.

Hari Om Tat Sat

Postcards is available for download from eMusic, Napster, Rhapsody and iTunes.

News: January 2006

Technica Curiosa Records collaboration project Fuzzy Systems have a new release on Ancient Records the brainchild of Leitrim based experimental sound artist Stephen Rennicks. Stephens record label Ancient Records, 'Moment Series' asks artists to interpret the phrase 'To Stretch a Moment is to Live Outside Time'. The audio piece is to be at least 20 minutes in duration.

International collective Fuzzy Systems contributed the track ‘We are Floating in the Navel of Maha-Vishnu'. The Secret Society did a remix of the track for release in the 'Moments Series'. This time Fuzzy Systems was Joshue O’Connor, Roger Lenoir and Fiona Guiheen. According to Ancient records: "The track sounds like a slowly evolving mystical revelation, a slow flash like moment of contemplative illumination". For more see the Ancient Records site.

News: October 2005

Technica Curiosa Records own Screaming Bones play Oiche Teamair Rugby Club Navan (this Friday, 2ist Oct) with 'Minty and the Freshmen', 'Tandem Felix','I-Soul', 'Devolution', 'Moon' and 'Kelfin Oberon'. doors 9pm.

It looks like being a great night. With all proceeds going to the Hill of Tara vs. Motorway campaign.

For more info on the gig and the campaign see:

• Indymedia
• Tara SOS
• Save Tara

Screaming Bones are born

The latest Technica Curiosa sonic incarnation is as 'Screaming Bones'. This is an audio meldown consisting of Josh and co-sonic conspirator Robert Waterhouse (of Colossus and the Headhunters). 'The Bones' dream up a bluesy mix of rhythms and rhymes based on many of Josh's songs that can be also found in a different form on the "Exile ends in Glory" album

'The Bones' music is very much in the spirit of Tech Records ethos of "Beats and Blues for the New Age". Quality music and lyrics are the focus but the Bones may stray into any musical landscape. So if you like conscious lyrics and funky rhythms and if the New Age is wearing you out - Rattle them Bones!!