Bounds

In 2020 I bought a double album by Craven Faults, Erratics And Nonconformities, six tracks of foreboding analogue ambient, modular synths, dark kosmische, made to accompany walks across post- industrial northern Britain, the soundtrack to abandoned foundries, stone walls, damp valleys, murky canal towpaths and moorland. It was hugely atmospheric and difficult to ignore, not the sort of ambient that becomes background music but foreground instrumental ambient, a very present sound. Sometimes it would leave me feeling totally enveloped by the sound, layers of recorded sound that bore a hole through me and left me feeling like something cathartic had happened. One evening listening to it it made me feel anxious and like the world was caving in. Full disclosure- this was after Isaac died and maybe is as much about how I was feeling as about the music, but I haven't been back to Craven Faults since. 

A new EP came out last month, four tracks that are intended to soundtrack a thirty seven minute trek across some part of northern England. Craven Faults is non- specific about the precise location but it's 'less than twenty miles north west of the city' (Leeds? Sheffield? Bradford?) and takes in the gathering dusk, a gritstone pillar destroyed by lightning, a tarn, and hillsides. The tracks- Long Stoop, Groups Hollows, Lampes Mosse and Waste & Demesne- vary from five minutes through to eighteen and are best encountered in one sitting, a kosmische but also earthbound trip where repetition is central and layers of analogue sound and drones build, with occasional sudden bursts of synth swooping in, like a flock of birds wheeling overhead. Buy Bounds at Bandcamp.