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Our Solitary Confinement

by Sieben

/
1.
Dead Bird 03:51
Dead bird Master and prisoner of your flesh. Effortless ‘til final confinement. Still gawk and sneer, your stance is cocked. Though your jaw has dropped, the mock has not. Beneath it all we are bones as you but awkward, pedantic and Earth-bound too. You manipulate the air below, your dip and soar made us marvel and envy. Destroyer on the factory floor. Cat-taunt prowess, bead-eye vicious man. Still gawk and sneer, your stance is rot. Though your jaw has dropped you scowl our hidden secret. Beneath it all we are bones as you but awkward, pedantic and Earth-bound too. You manipulate the air below, your dip and soar made us marvel and envy. But beneath it all we are bones as you—a palace, a prison but Earth-bound too. You manipulate the ground below. Above your dip and soar made us marvel and envy. Hell’s impish messenger spells our future out in bones.
2.
Broken Greenhouse Our strive for light makes us compete. Our strive for height makes us weak. Our strive for ground makes us reach. Our resilience makes us need. Our strife in life and fights for peace, we strive for night and its release. Let nature run wild, or trim and enclose it? Nurture or meddle with what nature imposes? In the greenhouse—red flowers grow. Weeds and flowers—bathe in the glow. If we fight for what’s right, do we fall for our wrongs? If we live and let live do we nurture the strong? In the greenhouse—red flowers grow. Weeds and flowers—bathe in the glow. If we fight for what’s right, do we fall for our wrongs? If we live and let live, do we nurture the strong? The fakers, loud shakers, impotent chasers of spangle and baseness, the rattle of drums and the takers, rally the herd, blinkered unhindered. The acter’s tangible lines, or the thinker’s binding vines? To grip or embrace if we fight for what’s right? Have we raised too high, blocked the light and sealed our fate?
3.
Loading Bay 02:47
Loading Bay Days marked with a white stone—we were brought here alone. Delivered blooded unseasoned—“Whitened sepulchres,” he said. “But within full of dead men’s bones.” On our charcoal days we listened, then soon forgot in the froth of delight and the flotsam days. Born into purple. Born the white light heat of day. Born in the dead ends and ditches. Born for night and its rite. Born to chains, born to right. Born in shade or shadow. Born from the ashes. Born into lanes.
4.
(instrumental)
5.
(instrumental)
6.
The Mechanics Of Intuition Mark Harding had the eye; could calibrate hands to ticking seconds. He throbbed whirring cogs, felt the measure in the bar, the weight in the wheel. In the amplitude of his steady hand he knew without knowing. Always late, he estimates his room for leeway and foreman Mackinlay’s eager eye averts to allot him grace, Harding’s quota always filled. Always late, he calculates capacity for leeway. He knew his sum, and would tread a measure ‘til the horn dissolved in a whistle. But he knew more: Immeasurables his eye could not account or scale, brittle thoughts he could not handle for fear of breaking. He let the music wash him. And so outside to her: He longed for her arms, pined her soft warm skin, her touch a match to his kindling. And the counting could stop, and the music sink in. He longed for her arms, pined her soft warm skin, her touch a match to his kindling. And the counting could stop, and the music sink in.
7.
Fire Drill 05:15
Fire Drill Today was fire drill the stamp and grind stop. Skiver’s delight, we filed out in lines, our school yard time. Cowling and Smith set each other dares. Tolson flicked a rhythm on a can; Mackinlay stares and points and glares. Harding, Peterson turned and ran. Back upstairs, the fag room empty and the old pot plate; feeling half their weight they lit and flicked, oasis of a double-break. Fell asleep to smouldering dreams. And then the sound: A distant crowd. And then the sound. Harding would have played the drums, or inside-left to great applause, inside, Peterson would have tackled blazes; hosed this crappy factory down, sifted charcoal remains, kicked up this old plate, remembered happy times crouched round; the faggers team, the skiver’s eleven. They fell asleep their smouldering dreams. And then the sound: A distant crowd. And then the sound: A distant crowd. Their dreams smouldering up in smoke. Their dreams smouldering up in smoke.
8.
Picture Of Corridor Our corridor of light and shade; glow cast from what me make, corridor my thought, shadow plumbed and forged then shaped. Absence released and rhythm locked, abstraction to nut and bolt. The tincture of what we are, the cold strip light of obsession. The frost of fire—the vent of spleen. Schemed and forged—made real by dreams. The stark and simple—diffused by light. Held softly in hand—‘til taken in flight.
9.
10.
11.
Factory Floor This the factory floor that shaped our lives, and warped our limbs—we weft our plans for escape. With our work we worked well, for cobbled and broke we hobbled out to twilight. Our sweat greased the cogs that still rattle and churn. That must, musky grease and filings, a heady taste, an era. My solitary confinement—my sweat greased the cogs that still rattle my head. Mackinlay’s cap still curbs the course of weeds, late Harding’s card unpunched. Thom Tolson’s gauge unchecked, Smith’s winch and chain rusted but unbroken. This the factory floor that shaped our lives, and warped our limbs—we weft our plans for escape. With our work we worked hard, for cobbled and broke we hobbled out to twilight. The clock ticks and halts, ticks and halts. I half expect the hooter to sound and release me, and the stamping stop.
12.
Peterson’s Seat Peterson told me when the stamping stops the cogs will snag the sky will catch and halt, our clock will stick, and rattle-shut music die. Peterson told me of the silence of drips and the ravage of weeds round his lonely seat machinery of green ratchets its need. Peterson told me the hum would stop, but it did not. The cogs still flourish, rattle and shuttle. The clock still stuck the hum beneath my feet.
13.
Workshop Window Our shop-floor window open (not to the outside, the light filters from another room) to our solitary confinement (on the inside we are creatures of the night). The stifled air—hangs and blows the clock tick and halt (on the outside we never see the light of day). Outside his love is waiting, lolling a limp knee. Idling, he calibrates his hand to ticking seconds. Feet, to the beat of minutes, his head nods the hour. Ears keen to the thin whistle cutting the stamp and grind. A world apart ‘til the horn’s release. He cups her waist, and squeezes her breast in one swift move. The line flows out, and carries them downstream. The line flows out, and carries them downstream. A world apart ‘til the horn’s release. He cups her waist, and squeezes her breast in one swift move. The line flows out, and carries them downstream. The line flows out, and carries them downstream.
14.
15.
16.
17.

about

This was the first Sieben album to be a solo endeavour, but was before the looping phase of my Sieben career. That would come next, with the release of Sex & Wildflowers. Songs on this album were inspired by, or written in conjunction with photographs by Danish photographer Kristine Haffgaard. (www.palimpsestphoto.dk) We inspired each other. This record has been mastered for vinyl by Bobby Bachinger at MAG Studio, Germany. Sleeve design by Martin Bedford.

This vinyl edition runs to two records. All songs from Our Solitary Confinement are included, plus an unreleased work, The Sound Of His Horn. Written at the same time, The Sound Of His Horn was intended to be a book CD release through Tartarus Press. The idea was that it would accompany the book the music takes its name from, by author John William Wall (pen-name Sarban). For some reason this never quite happened. It is possibly one of my most ambient works - though has its scary moments, principally because it was written to accompany a spooky tale. The music to the Sound Of His Horn pinches and intertwines musical lines and beats from Our Solitary Confinement, Voyager (an album released under my own name that I was also working on at the time), and Hellfires (Redroom 002, released 2001). I'm often working on quite a few projects at the same time. With those that aren't central to what I do, as with the Sound Of His Horn, I enjoy being free of 'writing from fresh', and will lift and re-use material. So strange to come back to these pieces I've never re-listened to, and hear echoes of Our Solitary Confinement peek through the soundscape.

credits

released February 2, 2017

CREDITS: This record was recorded at Redroom Studio, Sheffield, England, during 2002. It was written, performed and produced by Matt Howden. The original CD (TRI 151) came out on the Trisol/Iceflower label.

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