Today marks eighty years since the devastating atomic bombing of Hiroshima. My song Paper Cranes documents an emotional visit to the peace museum and my encounter with a survivor. Every August 6th, I donate any Bandcamp profits to a Hibakusha charity.
Last year, Tokyo-born, Berlin-based artist Tot Onyx included Paper Cranes in her deeply moving Hiroshima/Nagasaki mix on NTS — an hour of “Nuclear Age” music remembering the devastating events of August 1945 while also contemplating the present.
Making this mix gave me a quality of time to reflect the ongoing genocide and atrocities that are taking place right now. It proved to me that sometimes music can tell stories better than the language.
It’s becoming a habit that we head up North each Summer. This time we spent a few days in remote Northumberland, before heading to Edinburgh, Glasgow and Motherwell.
Kielder
It took six hours to travel the 210 miles to our isolated cottage just past Kielder Water, with its own two acres of land leading down to the modest winding waters of the North Tyne and views across marshy moorland towards the Scottish border a few hundred metres beyond.
The bright pink of Fireweed was everywhere, including the cottage garden, and the Swallows nesting in the neighbouring barn swooped and strafed all day long. We enjoyed a gorgeous first night with golden hour sunlight, until the midges came out and we hurried indoors. After dark, Tawny Owl calls echoed through the valley.
Experimenting by the North Tyne.Further experiments in the garden.Our cottage after dark.
We made this short trip for several reasons. A major factor was the location, which suited more ACE-funded activities, and I conducted several field recording sessions with different experimental setups — some in the garden, one on a grassy pathway, others right by the river. For one session, I waded through waist-high reeds to reach a table-like tree stump, but had to speedily abort when an army of ants took an interest in me and my kit. Over the three days I acquired quite a few stings and bites.
We walked along a gravel track winding through the trees to reach James Turrell’s Skyspace, perched high on Black Fell, just below the Kielder Observatory. We love his Deer Shelter at YSP, so made sure to visit this one. And we got lucky as we pretty much had the place to ourselves for an hour, watching as sunshine and blue sky arrived to transform the space. I saw lots of good birds throughout our stay, and the highlight was a pair of Spotted Flycatchers seen on our walk back down the track. The wild flowers were good too, notably Common Spotted Orchid and the fiery Fox-and-Cubs.
James Turrell’s Skyspace from above.Sunshine illuminates the Skyspace interior.
The following day, we went to Kielder Water Birds of Prey Centre, to wander around and meet the residents. Highlights included Little Red the tiny falcon across from Milly the enormous White-Tailed Sea Eagle, getting up close with a saucy Black Kite (aka Tombi), and admiring all the owls. We also loved watching tame chaffinches hop around the tethered predators, seemingly oblivious to the danger. A little later, we enjoyed flying demos featuring five birds: Barn Owl, Eurasian Eagle Owl, the saucy Black Kite, Ashy-faced Owl, and Common Kestrel, and our wise-cracking hosts ensured everyone got a go with the glove.
Milly the White-Tailed Eagle. Photo by Geri.With Ella the Barn Owl. Photo by Geri.With Connor the Kestrel.
Midweek in the remoteness of Northumberland, it often feels like there’s nobody for miles — vast open landscape, empty roads and surprisingly few holidaymakers. So it feels a bit odd to drive up two-miles of winding, tree-flanked gravel track to the top of a bleak fell at 9pm on a dark, wet Thursday evening, to find another 30 or so people sat in their cars, waiting to be ushered into a strange structure for a sold-out astronomy lecture.
Having braved midges and drizzle, we received a warm welcome into the long thin Kielder Observatory, its square entrance drawn in sci-fi red light. The evening’s team greeted each visitor personally — a thoughtful touch that typified the warmth and intimacy of the event.
The event was great, with three talks in different spaces. We received an intro about measuring the scale of the universe in light years. Next, a talk about rocks where we held a 4.6 billion-year-old meteorite. Lastly, we gathered around the huge telescope to learn about its 16“ mirror and hand-cranked positioning. The unplanned highlight came at the end of the event as everyone left the building to find that, despite the rain still drizzling down, the sky had finally cleared, allowing guide Liam to give an impromptu tour of the night sky, using a super-powerful handheld laser to accurately point out stars, constellations and nebulae.
Arriving at the observatory.The dark meteorite is billions of years old.Geri staring into space.
Leaving the observatory, we seized our opportunity to revisit the Skyspace. Since the track is only open during observatory events, and as ours was the second-to-last car to leave, we drove a little further downhill and parked right outside. The installation can be accessed 24 hours a day, but to visit after midnight in total darkness felt excitingly illicit. (There’s usually a subtle interior light show designed to enhance the after-dark experience, but apparently it’s been out of action for a while.)
We entered cautiously at 00:15 and stayed only five minutes, just in case someone shut the barrier at the bottom of the hill. It was incredible to experience the space alone in the dark — a perfect circle of night sky directly above with only the sound of a few drips for company. A profound sense of peace came over me, before I grew unnerved by the possibility that something — a bird, a bat, or some unseen presence — might shatter the silence.
Edinburgh
Treats from Lannan. Photo by Geri.
Early the next morning, we packed and set off on a mostly scenic two-hour drive to Edinburgh. Upon arrival, we headed straight to Lannan Bakery for a lunchtime treat.
Lannan is always Geri’s main reason to come here, but this time mine was the major new Andy Goldsworthy exhibition, which I’ll detail in a separate post.
The following morning, we walked back to Stockbridge and joined a much longer line at Lannan. After queuing for 95 minutes in a sun trap, we finally reached the door. It’s always worth the wait, though. We took our hard-earned pastries and two coffees (each) to Princes Street Gardens, then spent a few hours calmly navigating through thousands of tourists and Fringe leafleteers in beautiful sunshine.
Glasgow & Motherwell
In the late afternoon, we drove to Glasgow for an overnight by the quay, and very early the next morning, we headed to the 3rd Scottish Sumo Championships at the enormous Ravenscraig Sports Facility in Motherwell, where Geri exhibited her sumo illustrations alongside other market vendors.
International sumo teams lining up for the opening ceremony.
It was a long day, the event overran considerably and the market fizzled out, so we packed up at 6pm. Even with my foot down and only a couple of brief stops, the drive still took six hours. We were home by midnight and slept very well.
Our short trip took place from 29th July to 3rd August.
