Mushroom Music: Listen to King Oyster recorded live at EartH - spatial mix
Supporters and ticket holders get a free copy of a live recording of Brian d'Souza's biosonification set at EartH with a King Oyster mushroom. Mixed in spatial audio.
The dust has settled. We managed to squeeze 600 people into EartH Theatre for our A State Of Flo ‘Mushroom Music’ launch party. In typical mycelial fashion, it grew from being a simple live set featuring the incredible world of fungi sounds, to being a packed evening of entertainment, music, talks and dancing.
We had panel talks on nature and fungi (hosted by Sophie Shnapp), poetry by Charlie Gilmour, immersive rainforest deep listening by Gus Leudar, ambient listening from Dr Michelle, foraged stage design by the wonderful Green Art Department, part live show part Amazonian documentary by Natural Symphony, psychedelic after-party with DJ Inter-being, Dr Michelle and United Freedom Collective, mushroom market, slime mould diversion (thanks Max Mudie!), a surprise performance by folk singer-of-the-moment Sam Lee, and collaborations with the likes of Earth Percent, All Things Fungi, Fat Fox Mushrooms, Zero Hour UK, PAR Global, Lawyers 4 Nature and much more. Special thanks to Ray Shnapp for the photos and videos!
The atmosphere was palpable and we’ve received such good feedback post-show, which has been really special to hear. We are amazed that so many of you enjoyed the experience of listening to the fantastical, but slightly strange, sounds of fungi and plants on a Friday evening. THANK YOU for coming along.
We managed to capture my set and have had it mixed in spatial audio (thanks to L-Acoustics) and mastered for your home listening pleasure.
»»» All ticket holders can get a free copy by simply emailing me at brian@astateofflo.com , and all A State Of Flo substack ‘paid’ supporters will get a free copy too (along with all the other releases on the label).
»»» So, if you are reading this, please upgrade your subscription to ‘paid’ now (it’s only £5) and we’ll send you a Bandcamp code to download it for free. Alternatively, you can buy it from our Bandcamp
The set wouldn’t have been possible without the help from my dear friend Duncan Grant aka Cain. He’s a modular synth wizard and spent countless hours advising me on the modules to get in order to fully bring my live set of mycelial music to life. I’d also like to thank my studio neighbour Danny T for his help and for letting me borrow a few modules that allowed me to translate the fungi into music. Finally a massive thanks to Lex and everyone at Fat Fox mushrooms for helping to grow the fungi I was able to duet with on the night. As Lex told me, it’s a really hard task to ensure they fruit at the right time. Their rate of growth is so variable, and sometimes so fast that fungi can double in size overnight so getting it right was a real challenge.
I tried to embody the mycorrhizal fungi network through sounds. Modular synthesis is the best way to achieve this, with every modular acting as a mycorrhizal pathway, manipulating the data into sound elements that are in turn moved around the 360º sonic space. The changes in electrical voltage that living fungi make are the source of the note choices, I haven’t manipulated the notes in any way, just the sound modules that the notes play through. The main challenge was adjusting the note data that the fungi produce which is always changing due to them decomposing!
Brian d’Souza, April 24
Watch this video to see a sneak peak of the set.
You can buy the Mycorrhizal Fungi EP scratch ‘n’ sniff and scented vinyl record with beautiful artwork by Jananicole or digital release via our Bandcamp or from all good independent record stores. We have around 50 copies left and when they are gone they are gone! So be quick…!
Upgrade your subscription here and receive King Oyster, as well as digital copies of Mycorrhizal Fungi EP, Ceibo and an Ambient Flo ‘Zine in the post + all the other forthcoming releases we have on the label. Thank you for your support!