Allotment Tapes #2\u00a0<\/em>visits with Steno Vitale and his partner Michelle, the former a musician in the early music ensemble Carnival Band. \u00a0The two took on the challenge of clearing a small plot and populating it with vegetables, fruit and \u201ca place to jam\u201d (which is also a fun play on words). \u00a0Steno calls this \u201cA Happy Place to Be,\u201d while music cascades around the garden. \u00a0The birds are happy, the people are happy, even the water seems happy, although a siren in the background hints at trouble in the outer world. \u00a0The violin is the main instrument, while the interview becomes an instrument of its own. \u00a0At certain junctures, the music stops completely before re-launching, a pause between thoughts.<\/p>\n March\u2019s tape (not actually a tape, don\u2019t ask) focuses on Rachel Brooke\u2019s work at the community orchard. \u00a0She speaks of \u201cAccess to These Spaces,\u201d looking after nature and each other. \u00a0\u201cWe provide a hot meal,\u201d she shares; everyone is family. \u00a0The phrase \u201chappy place\u201d resurfaces as a discovery for younger people. \u00a0How many green spaces are preserved while others are destroyed? \u00a0Joni Mitchell\u2019s prophetic words come to mind: they paved paradise and put up a parking lot. \u00a0<\/em>The Ragbeck bubbles in the back, serenaded by guitars, brass and fowl. \u00a0The EP\u2019s subtitle: \u00a0We Are All Visitors Here.<\/em><\/p>\n St. Anns in the Countryside\u00a0<\/em>interviews gardener and historian Mo Cooper, who begins by talking about \u201cLittle Animals\u201d before delving deep into the centuries of flourish, decay and restoration. McElroy calls the music \u201cscavenged, repurposed and scraped together stuff from my hard drive;\u201d one cannot help but see a parallel with the garden. \u00a0No matter what its genesis, the music flows around the narrative like water around stones. \u00a0A particularly clear guitar passage arrives in the sixth minute of the opener as Cooper speaks of the older rules for weddings. \u00a0\u201cThe Earlier Gang\u201d showcases strings as Cooper talks about \u201cguns and knives and prostitution.\u201d \u00a0In the title track, a contented McElroy sings without words, while \u201cThe Decline\u201d is haunted by a persistent motor.<\/p>\n And then it is May; the flowers are beginning to poke through the earth. \u00a0I Wanted the Trees\u00a0<\/em>offers contrasting approaches to gardening, presented by husband and wife Gail and Peter. \u00a0In the Myers-Briggs Inventory, Peter would be a J and Gail would be a P; his plot is \u201cimmaculate and neat,\u201d hers \u201cwild and self-seeding.\u201d \u00a0The title track of I Wanted the Trees\u00a0<\/em>sounds like the bottom of Bj\u00f6rk\u2019s cliff: \u201ccar parts, car doors, chairs, shoes, pieces of glass, batteries.\u201d \u00a0For thirty years, the land had gone untouched. \u00a0\u201cI wanted the trees,\u201d admits Gail. \u00a0And she and her husband went to work.<\/p>\n \u201cChickens and Twirly Things\u201d is one of the series\u2019 most endearing pieces, sounding exactly as one might expect. \u00a0The new addition is a harmonium, like a non-native plant. \u00a0\u201cThat cost me a pound, that cauliflower!\u201d exclaims Gail. \u00a0Again McElroy begins to sing. \u00a0The similarly amusing \u201cAin\u2019t Got a Shed (But I\u2019ve Got a Greenhouse)\u201d stops and starts as the recordist fumbles with his tape. \u00a0The title suggests a country song; the instrumental folk guitar follows suit. \u00a0In the final piece, McElroy adds opera and dialogue loops to the mix, like perennials.<\/p>\n Urban Nature <\/em>visits a managed habitat recently allowed to go wild. \u00a0\u201cThe birds still love it,\u201d writes McElroy. \u00a0The EP is different from its predecessors in that it is a single piece that begins and ends in field recordings, is free from dialogue and embeds a fully instrumented piece with wordless vocals. Birds and \u201cboy racers\u201d battle, but the birds seem to be winning. \u00a0Allowing the allotment to speak for itself is a perfect way to end the half year, as the artist\u2019s footsteps vanish into the green.<\/p>\n Each of these tapes is approximately twenty minutes long: 120 minutes to date, 120 to follow. \u00a0One wonders if they will indeed become tapes, and if so, whether they will number twelve or three. \u00a0In the digital era, it\u2019s also okay to save the cost and energy of production. \u00a0These are tapes because the interviews are taped; but they would also make a wonderful souvenir. \u00a0We\u2019ll have to wait and see; the next six months await! \u00a0(Richard Allen)<\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/acloserlisten.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2.jpg?w=300\")
<\/a>Ben McElroy<\/strong>\u2018s Allotment Tapes\u00a0<\/em>series has reached its halfway point, so we feel it\u2019s a good time to dive back in ~ especially as people in the Northern Hemisphere have all returned to the great outdoors by now, and St. Anns Allotment is bustling with activity. \u00a0We covered the first installment here<\/a><\/strong> back in January, and pick up the thread with the second.<\/p>\n