Emotional Yardwork by Ned Milligan

drum, hula hoop: NM
rain, hail, thawing ice: "nature"

recorded / arranged in Spring and Summer of 2021
mastered by Taylor Deupree
thank you: Brad & Taylor

This set of tracks is both in line with what has become my default approach--recording outside, often with some kind of weather involved--and outside of that, as I put aside chimes to focus on the "singing drum" that I began working with on my last album. In some ways, this set is the most minimal thing I've done, but it's also the most restless, rhythmic one. I like that those contexts are intertwined on this project.

With "Fixed Point Focal," what you're hearing is essentially me sitting on gravel during a rainstorm, playing along to the tonal scatter of the rain hitting the drum. For a while now, when rain starts, an urge rises in me to enter outside and record the drum with it. Is it because it adds cheap drama? (Possibly!) Or a cooling respite? (Sometimes true.) I guess I'd like to say it's a certain type of gratitude performance.

Recorded in one take with some whittling, "Fixed Point Focal" leads into "Outdoor Play," which wanders around, happily finds it footing, and then just as happily forgets what feet are in the first place.

"Slow Dance" began during a warmer winter day when snow along the eaves of the house were beginning to thaw and created dripping patterns. By positioning the drum in different ways and at different locations of the surrounding yard, I gathered these patterns and later overlaid them, also processing them in pitch and duration. Combined with hail from an earlier storm that winter, it all gathers into a collection of sounds that is swirling and slightly overwhelming.--yet it feels alive in a way that is surprising and exciting to me. It sounds nice LOUD.

Hopefully some of that translates to your experience with it, too. Thank you.

The Jewel Garden is part label, pure vanity.

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