Track By Track: Curtain Twitcher – Leap the Dips

10Minute Read

Music

Written by Wil

Some music could only have come from one place – Curtain Twitcher’s debut album is Sheffield through and through.

Not the Sheffield of Pulp or the Human League, though those ghosts are here somewhere, rattling around in the circuitry. This is the Sheffield of the moors looming over the city, of underground basement gigs and illegal-ish late nights at the now-demolished Club 60, where Sophie Stone and Grace Griffins first found each other and started making a beautiful machine racket.

Stone and Griffins operate in that sweet spot between the organic and the electronic – their downtempo post-Balearic chug doesn’t come from a laptop; it comes from analogue hardware that has no memory, that can’t be patched, that says “give it a play and see what happens.” Leap the Dips was made just like this; in bursts of improvisations, in Grace’s flat, on gear that throbs, twitches and refuses to behave. The results are more Delia Derbyshire’s Radiophonic Workshop than DAF, more Tangerine Dream than Depeche Mode. Not your average bloke-tronica.

Taking its name from one of the oldest rollercoasters in the world, the album has been quietly picked up by the likes of Piccadilly Records and Richard Norris of Beyond the Wizard Sleeve, passed hand to hand like a decent secret. The duo asked us to keep it that way… and then proceeded helpfully told us exactly what every track is about.

“Post-modern electronic music with nods to the unrealised future of Tangerine Dream, Brian Eno, & Shopping Trolley.”

Here, Curtain Twitcher guide us through Leap the Dips, track by track.

Our album “Leap the Dips” is a collection of tracks that came out of jams and improvisations. We use a variety of analogue synths and the like, which really lend themselves to moments of sound and music, they don’t store settings and recreating those sounds is sometimes impossible. Our tunes on this album started out as improvisations and were recorded as multitracks which we then built upon.

CT Live Notts 12.25 (credit Emma Thorpe)

MIGRATION

There are a lot of subtle references to nature and wildlife in our influences and music.

Migration refers to the journey made by birds between continents at certain times of year. This track has a fun feeling of setting out on a mission which is why we opened the album with it. We have also been starting our live sets with this track for the same reason, drawing the audience into the world behind the Curtains, for a bit of Twitchy Business.

NORTHERN FLICKER

The Northern Flicker is a species of woodpecker, we jumped on that because of the percussive part in the tune, which you will now associate forever with a woodpecker….

This was the first track we completed and really helped us realise how our sound would shape up.

Woodpeckers are notoriously shy and difficult to photograph. We reflected this idea in how we created the video for NF, it features both of us but you can only just work out it is us, slightly ephemeral in appearance.

ANALOGUE EPILOGUE

This is a journey inspired by the Peak District and in particular the view over Sheffield from up on the moors.

In the middle of this track, the music breaks into a crazy organ-driven wig out, where it all goes a bit mental. This musical section is a reference to eccentric chance encounters and conversations on a journey which then change the course of events. The tune is like a big trip, how we jammed it on the analogue synths, started from building the sounds of the intro drone and progressing from there.

<a href="https://curtaintwitcher.bandcamp.com/album/leap-the-dips">Leap The Dips by Curtain Twitcher</a>

THE PERFECT LIGHT

A track inspired by the last lingering shimmers of a sunset, also known as “the golden hour” – the period when the sky is filled with a soft warm reddish light. It represents an optimal window for capturing something beautiful.

There was a bunch of flowers in a vase made by Grace’s mum, in the studio, glowing in the late sunshine of summer. The flowers inspired the jam that is this tune. We made a video using a photograph taken at that moment, combined with a scan of Grace’s optical nerve, which had a strange beauty in its technical presentation and felt like a good juxtaposition to represent our instruments.

This track is the only one on the album that is simply the original recording of an improvisation, nothing added or altered.

SONATE

The word “sonate” refers to sounds made by birds; noises produced by mechanisms other than their vocal organ. An intentional form of communication, it can be drumming , whistling or rattling; using wings, tail feathers or beaks.

With our music we’ve created many sounds – be it melodies, textures or layers – that communicate ideas and emotions in the absence of recorded vocals. It is quite central to the premise of Curtain Twitcher and this album as a whole.

INFLIGHT ENTERTAINMENT

Imagine yourself on a spaceship with a bunch of folk you met at the end of a rave, you are all headed for Venus but have no idea when you’ll get there. Perhaps this is the soundtrack to that journey?