DCM 011 - Mechanical Phase music - Phase music, Phm 1 - my 11th album. The first of three volumes of the Collected Phm studies.

Phase Looping as a genre in itself, takes over from a notion which began with an extended performance in Drum music – with ‘Shaker Loop’ Rh 17, a very short study on my album Dm 3. By sliding sound over sound, I souped up a piece beyond human performance - to advance the call on musical perception. I then turned the notion on it’s head – not just to ‘assist’ a performance but to be a notion of music in and of itself. Where I accept the notion of mechanism as a formed Agency, as a music in itself. So I set up space I called the ‘Phase lab’ to get into this idea of looping as the point of music. My judgement is now the mechanics of the phase

Phase music, as I define it, Is one in which tapes or loops of tape, are offset against one another, at a given time interval, so that their complexes of content will ride apart from one another and ride back into sync, over a period given by the offset. They are said to 'Phase', rather, to go in and out of Phase. Over a short phase, the effect is predictable, over longer phases however, whist necessarily automatic, the result is, if the material is sufficiently complex, seemingly unpredictable. That is to say it can result in material, and musical effects, 'greater', literally, than the sum of its parts. One must choose one’s material carefully, and off set to phase with even more caution. The trick is to play back and re-cut the phase, as many times as is necessary, until the result interests the ear, then as music. In that sense, you can be said to have composed it - that is that you derive the result you want. Sometimes though, Nature surprises you - then I'd say I've been 'Given' it – as I often did in Art.


Mechanical Phase music 1 – Rh 95. My first attempt to find such a music began with a skeletal mechanical Phase - it is like two parts set on odd cams, that move one another in an unpredictable way. It was the skeleton stage for a planned work but it interested me so much, I said it was a Work in itself - becoming – Rh 95. Giving it the mantle no. 1 in expectation of a second.

Mechanical Phase music 2 – Rh 96. I hung then a flesh on that Skeletal project Rh 95 – as I had originally intended to. Both parts were created from the sound recordings of closing doors. The second being a much richer, intensive sound, a fuller, mechanical phasing music. They are thus two separate but closely related works, over an hour in total.

Door Music 1 – Rh 97. Another two part set, the frame for which the second completes the pair. Door music 2 – Rh 98 follows on the next collection of Phase music studies - album Phm 2. The phasing here is chosen, the phased elements are chosen - this is music - prescribed from the doors of sections and lifts in a busy hospital.


An early reorganization of my music research interest defined my music into dedicated sets of Albums. This way things of a kin got heard together - as one type of album or another - by Genre - or Tranche as I styled them. In this Case Phase music; Phm - music derived from Tape Loops and Phase timing – by convention - Phm.

Albums 11 to 15 are the first five Phm albums, placed in a block, one of 5 blocks, placed like books on a shelf. in an in an overarching 'Group' of my first 27albums. Five Blocks for the Five Tranches - as they were founded (more of less) - five sets of studies and pieces, as my Foundational Group 'Blue Cherry' [after a friend]. The foundation stone the rest of my music is built on - in four further Groups.

The Five Phm albums in the Blue Cherry Group are: three volumes of quite advanced studies – Phm 1 Mechanical Phase music; Phm 2 Elevation Phase ; and phm 3 Mechanical Clock music; with two large scale works – Phm 4 Click Track Toe and Phm 5 Jove.

Beginning as a percussionist my first 7 albums are for Drums of various kinds, Drum music or Dm, my first area of research interest or Tranche. I soon realised there was a second area of percussion, as a generality over a specialism - percussion on anything other than Drums, MPm. The third of of five was the Phase music, realised by tape looping and timing - by convention – Phm.

The DCM album numbers are volumes in a [for the most part] chronological edition.- The DCM Broadhurst Edition - Prepared for the British Library in 2018. The Volumes or Albums themselves were actually released as and when it was possible. The Edition though, was planed to stand on the 'foundation Stone' of the Blue Cherry group.

The Rh catalogue, numbers my works, in order of Completion.