Noise is the future (Crank Lab Explosion – lab central, YouTube comment).

8.00 am: A communion. 8.30 am: Email arrivals have slowed to a trickle over the past few days. I’ll enjoy this ‘dry’ season while it lasts. Of late, I’ve become uncomfortably conscious of my routines: I sit in the same chairs and at the same desk; follow much the same pattern of work and rest, day-in, day-out; eat the same breakfast (more or less); wear the same type of clothes; play the same music; and write in the same diary. None of these patterns of behaviour are intrinsically unhelpful. However, their combined effect over time can have a deadening effect. Breaking-in on an established structure, suddenly and violently, is both reckless and counter-productive. Permanent and manageable change can only come gradually. The room must be re-arranged, one piece of furniture at a time.

9.00 am: I took up the threads of yesterday evening’s work. In the background, I played Indian classical music. Interestingly, in these proto-jazz ensembles, it’s often women vocalists and virtuosi who take centre stage and are, in effect, the band leaders. The combination of extraordinary musicianship, discipline, imagination, improvisation, and religious joy make for a heady combination:

11.00 am: The initial design drafts for the CD’s front and back covers were complete. Where possible, I’ve derived the typographic design and furnishings from the records’ original packaging material:

This CD also needed to have a continuity with the design of the previous two releases in The Aural Bible series. On, then, with the accompanying booklet cover and developing further visual elements, which the CD manufacturer will need to bedeck the inner gatefold and disc.

1.40 pm: I burrowed into my archives of performance and workshop to extract serviceable images:

The aim is to encapsulate that which cannot be discerned from listening to the compositions alone. Designing for a CD format has its limitations. Whatever images are chosen need to be sufficiently clear and simple, so as to be comprehensible on a relatively small scale (12 × 12 cm).

7.30 pm: There was one more image to conceive; this would be a composite representing the themes referred to in the compositions. Thereafter, I attended to a track from an early, streamed suite of sound works. I’d become sufficiently discomforted by the mix to merit action.