Medium

Following their second album ‘Demiurge’ released in May 2011, ‘Medium’ arrives as the first non-studio based production by Emptyset, recorded on location in the remote Woodchester Mansion in Gloucestershire. The collection of tracks explores the duo’s preoccupations with the elemental properties of sound and bare rhythmic structures and overlays it onto the textural possibilities of space and material. The project marks their first act of adapting their analogue-based studio system into an architectural intervention, pushing extreme bass and feedback into the irregular spaces of the unfinished building. The rural mansion, which remains an incomplete remnant of the Gothic revival and a place studied by both architectural researchers and psychic investigators, provides a rich source of texture as the sparse palette of sine waves and noise is adorned with the intricate details of the space. ‘Medium’ emerges as an act of translation remodelling the house through sonic impulses into a state of audio, a fluid transformative gesture and a process mirroring the sonar impulses of the bats residing within Woodchester's rooftop sanctuary. The project, supported by the Woodchester Mansion Trust, was provided technical support by the renowned Bristol based sound engineer Mat Sampson who managed the array of vintage microphones and preamps distributed within the building along with the central monophonic sound system. The completed release is presented as a CD and a limited vinyl 12” which includes a special poster of analogue processed imagery by Clayton Welham and Sam Williams, who developed the recent Emptyset video for Function and who will once again be producing a short piece for ‘Medium’ using video feedback applied to footage captured within Woodchester.