The third release on PAN and Visionist’s label venture CODES comes from Liverpool-based producer Ling.
Built from a library of field and browser recordings collected over several years, Attachment is a series of vast, glitchy collages attempting to make connections between data manipulation and “habitual mental tendencies”.
“Within each track there are a lot of small incomplete narratives that I want to pass in and out of focus,” Ling told FACT. “I guess that I’m trying to evoke a feeling of slight disorientation through overload.”
The EP’s title points to his own examination of past projects, he added. “It is quite an introspective EP, but it felt necessary for me to analyse the things I have been and are still attached to in order of positive progression.”
Read our Q&A with Ling below and stream Attachment in full ahead of its release on Friday, February 5. The EP was mixed by Chris Pawlusek, mastered by Matt Colton, and features artwork by PWR Studio & Bill Kouligas, with additional art by James Whipple.
The record is based on field and browser recordings you’ve made. What do you look for when you’re scraping for sounds?
It’s constantly changing, but I think for this EP the field recordings used feel like they exaggerate their realities. It’s that crossover between natural and synthesised sounds that will make me pull out my phone and record something. With the browser recordings I’m usually looking for something that can function as a timestamp, something subtle but comes from a specific time. This is the first time I’ve ever really organised my workflow, I had lots of semi-finished ideas that I wanted to visit again and reinterpret. Throughout I used a lot of granular and audio time compression techniques which allowed me to rapidly explore/present the library of sounds that I’d been collecting.
When you piece them together, are you looking to build a narrative, or evoke a feeling, or something else? What guides the way you build a track?
Within each track there are a lot of small incomplete narratives that I want to pass in and out of focus. I guess that I’m trying to evoke a feeling of slight disorientation through overload. Preparing the personalised bank of sounds to work with really helped me to get in the flow of the project and I succumbed to the momentum of instinct a lot of the time.
Why did you pick the title ‘Attachment’?
Examining past projects and unpicking the decisions made within them gave me a stronger idea of my instincts. It was interesting for me to see reappearing choices that didn’t really resonate but felt ingrained. From there on I became interested with the transference of choice and the dissonance between techniques used and my own ethics. It is quite an introspective EP but it felt necessary for me to analyse the things I have been and are still attached to in order of positive progression.
Have you read anything good lately?
Yeah, late last year I read Paul Virilio’s The Administration of Fear. Throughout he discusses the use of fear as an environment, and gives his insight into the affects of sudden globalisation on collective behaviour. Also I’m currently reading Laing’s Divided Self (Thanks Kepla). Laing’s approach to psychiatry and mental health was very important and is proving to be a valuable aid for my studies/work/life.
