Sound from a Town – Details, episodes & analysis

The electrical hums, mechanical whirs and cavernous clatters of Euston station platform is the sound bookending a journey to or from London. You're often out of it far too quick, though, either to sit on the train where these sounds are cushioned, or into the waiting area full of the sounds of human chatter, heels at a canter, the clacking of suitcase wheels, and the piped announcements. On Saturday 1st November, I went down onto the platform very early to wait next to my train and sat with the sonic signatures you're only otherwise likely to hear either in a rished passing visit or if you can sneek down early yourself. Maybe next time you're in Euston and you're looking up at the boards with hoards of other people shifting their weight to the other leg to find a bit of comfort while waiting and awash with the dominant sound of human conversations, listen to this and instead hear what the machines down the ramp are talking to each other about.

The Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, designed by Thomas Telford is the highest canal aqueduct in the world. If you're not sure if you're scared of heights or susceptible to height vertigo, it's a good place to find out. 

I got speaking to a lovely man walking his dog whilst recording this. He told me that the arches were built around bales of sheep wool to keep the weight of the 38 metre high arches down as well as hold the structure while building them. He also mentioned that lanolin, the waxy substance that keeps sheeps wool waterproof, was used to seal the canal. Doing some reading online, ox-blood was also used in the mortar to help prevent it crumbling away during freeze-thaw cycles. I'm not sure how many sheep were sheared and oxen bled for the constuction of the aqueduct, but imagining these 220 year-old animal materials impregnated throughout its structure didn't help much when walking back across it. 

Anyway, in this recording you can hear blackbirds, flycatchers, thrushes, wrens and chiff chaffs, as well the occasional 'Morning!' as people walk or cycle by. There's also the occasional drip from the canal and the constant rumble of the River Dee below. We end with the sound of a narrowboat turning its engine back on after completing the 307 metre journey over the valley.

Recorded at 8am, Sunday 29th June.

www.soundfromatown.com

Spend some time with some chill chickens from Stamford Street allotments in Ellesmere Port. Clipped the mics to the chicken wire roof and left them for 30 mins. There may be standard background chat, the sound of planes, strimmers, cars, doors and windows closing or other suburban sounds, but the occasional cluck, trill, wing flap or the sound of the feeder helps to position you properly amongst the allotment plots.

Recorded on 31st July at around 7pm.

A recording of dawn chorus on Ince Marshes.

The protected nature reserve sits in the Stanlow marshland now occupied by heavy industry. Some of the heaviest - oil refineries, chemical plants, glass factories. 

As I arrived, as well as the familiar orange hue felting itself to the cloud cover above the oil refinery, what struck me was the noise of the Encirc glass factory dominating the soundscape of birds waking up and having a stretch of their vocal chords. 

I was left wondering whether this din affects the sound of the birds, whether they sleep okay, whether they get used to it, or if they see it as positive compitition. Either way, this soundclash is a pretty unique one, and another way to show how the lives of wildlife, machines, and humans are inexorably entwined in this place.

www.georgepowell.online

Apparently the most beautiful service station in the country. On the M6, Tebay offers artisan food, drinks, bits and bobs, and is set back from the motorway with views of the Lake District. This hark to nature, with products inside adorned with earthly tones, is situated in stark contrast to the greyscale tarmac, blue shiny signs and white and red scintillations of motorways.

Recorded at the National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port.

I used the Lom Geofon attached directly to the engine, giving it a nice low burbling sound, and combined this with a single Clippy EM272 positioned quite close to give a decent crispness. 

This episode was recorded just outside BAE systems in Govan, Glasgow, on a quiet, unassuming - but slightly windy - residential street. 

The day before I recorded, people protested outside to try and stop the manufacture and sale of weapons and other military technology by the British Company. BAE make Machines, bombs, and computerised hardware and software built with the aim of surveilling or killing people. This technology earned BAE around £23bn of revenue in 2023. 

As I walked past, I could hear whirring and buzzing and clattering from inside the incredibly secure complex. In Glasgow, BAE mainly build Royal Navy Warships, some of which circle the Mediterranean outside Palestine. The sounds in the recording, then, are created by the processes of building fleets of floating, weaponised assets of war. A low-key ambience of state violence, the rumblings of which are indistinguishable, for me, from their intended outcome - death and destruction.

It's 12:45 and 22 degrees on the 13th May. It doesn't seem that warm when you read it like that, but you and your mate have been walking around with your luggage for the best part of an hour, hungry, waiting to stumble on the perfect place to have the final proper meal in Barcelona. After walking past a couple of places that don't seem quite right, you spot two seats in dappled sunlight that beckon you over. The perfect place to sit down for a few minutes and look for food on Google Maps. You feel the weight lift from your feet and back as you sit down and. You decide to simply listen to the world go by. 

Location: 41°22'56.9"N 2°11'24.0"E

Stopped to record the sound of cars heard through the echoic Clyde Tunnel Walkway. Decided to bring out the Lom Geofón to record the reverberations through the metal railings, adding a lovely tense drone. Recorded in 3 different locations and mixed together. 

www.georgepowell.online

A mixture of a walkabout, asking fans their first memories and how they feel about Klopp leaving, as well as catching the singing of You'll Never Walk Alone at the start of the match.