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Little do I realise but I am about to be transformed into one of these. I am on my way to Glasgow to kick start Am Bothan_The Bothy into reality with Mandy McIntosh. Mandy has proposed to make a semi permanent dwelling in the Galloway Forest Park to be occupied by wandering stargazers and has invited me to compose a flexible sonic intervention for it. My plan is to create something without electricity.  Vibratory.  Our plan this week is to find the site to build with.

I am finally inside the geodesic dome that Bucky built for the 1967 World Fair, Expo 67. I have wanted to be inside one of these things since experiencing the underwater world with sharks and contemplating planet earth as a spinning ball of water with a few lumps of rocks pointing up through it.  This was the US pavilion which suffered a fire in ‘76 and lost its original acrylic fills though the steel lattice structure remains intact. Then Environment Canada restored it and now it’s The Biosphere, a museum dedicated to water and the environment.

You could also say I’m inside a massive version of a fullerene molecule. Whatever, the place and timing is resonant as I’m preparing to perform an eight channel version of Where are the wild ones for Montrealers tonight.  Check..

I am heading to Oboro, Montreal to spend the week in bed with a bunch of Canadians to make new pieces for Sonic Bed _Quebec. Fantastic.

Its a full week. A workshop, a lecture, an 8 channel solo and duo with Magali Babin on Thursday 20th.

Please check the Daily Sporadic and Lab Eight at music for bodies for up to date information. This is the trip that got volcanic ash grounded back in April. Its a tight squeeze now but fabulous we are managing it.

I am set to play Tangible for the Turbine Hall, TATE Modern with the new tuning fork instrument.  I use super balls to strike them, a biscuit tin to resonate and an electric guitar to amplify. Then its strike and go, into LiSa and out again through various matrices. I am pushing and pulling them 1998 style and it’s only stereo. The acoustic is so huge and wild in here that I think this could be a good thing.  And being back on a stage will mean I won’t hear what the audience do either. It could be a great night.

I’m playing free for No Soul for Sale festival and Tate 10 year anniversary, even though they are sponsored by BP. I also ate at  “Shanghai” in Dalston the other night even though they have shark fin soup on the menu. What are you going to do about that Kaffe?

This is the instrument I am using to vibrate the liquid in the three cymatic vessels that spin the three lasers on the wall and ceiling. The loss of the red laser yesterday is overcome by Dmitry Gelfund of Optofonica who brings in his full range  machine which he can also control manually. We play together and I am inspired by the organic multicoloured swirlings to play the forks in a very different way. Do not think it’s just pretty or trippy. It is alive and appears organic and real  and phenomenally beautiful.

We open the space and play a concert at 8pm to enthusiastic listeners. It is OK but not as strong as some moments during the day. Fatal mistake to play all day before a concert but this is an open lab situation .. Excellent.

256Hz resonated through an eight inch square three inch deep biscuit tin makes these vibrations through on of the cymatic vessels.

But the day brings tragedy. The red laser burns out and back in London, David Cameron makes a deal with Nick Clegg. It rains, is freezing and the warm Javanese restaurant has closed at 9pm.

I have arrived in Amsterdam to make, play  and research multi-channelled vibratory pathways with Optofonica, TeZ and the Anharmonium at the Melkweg for the week.

Fabulous to be back in Amsterdam and back in an inspired working environment. January 1st 1996 was the freezing night I drove here to work at Steim and find myself discovering LiSa and embarking on that trajectory that has kept me coming back. What’s interesting now are the synergetics at work behind these synchronated fields of research with the Optofonica crew. I met TeZ in a cathedral  for the Radar festival in Mexico City 2006. I have made an AV work for Optofonica, and he has installed Sonic Bed at Monte Video. Currently we discover we are both on Buckminster Fuller  and dedicated Japanese martial arts training trips. This is the first time we have managed to work together.

We perform the first stage  of  the Ephemeral Animation project with Nenagh Watson at Central School of Speech and Drama through  Conversations with an umbrella.

The storm scene is stunning. A pile of broken umbrellas sit discarded whilst a storm rattles the house. CCSD’s sound system is not nearly up to it and we lose 10% of the audience. For an international puppet festival this kind of puppetry,  static object animated by active sound,  is unknown.

The forks take a train trip to Ghent to premiere the Prongs duo with Thomas Smetryns at Vooruit. We perform our London devised score, a variety of throbbing A’s, descent, ascent, striking, C’s, ice blocks, spillikins. Pure tones and analogue processings through a biscuit tin, clip and paper vibrators play along with digital action with LiSa. Kaffe’s  forks are amplified with electric guitar pick ups and Thomas’s with microphones. The combination works well.

A focussed listening audience are entranced for fifty minutes in the dark through four speakers. Wim produces fizz to celebrate after the clapping.  It all ends in long discussion on Belgian and British politics over fine vegan dinner. Excellent to be playing in Belgium once more.

We will not be defeated by a volcano!

Sonic Bed_London , playing Melt inevitable in the music for bodies studio sets up to join in remotely with Sonic Bed_Quebec opening  at Oboro, Montreal, Canada. This is the first time two sonic beds have been in the same space.

We open in 5minutes..