Delighted to present a hallucinatory offering from Ciaran Mackle, recorded as part of a bill of similarly mind-expanding artists at OTO in September 2025, that featured Rory Salter, Regan Bowering and Vespertilio folia ferens - aka the duo of Luciano Maggiore and Seymour Wright.

In this set, performed entirely on a Bastl Microgranny granular sampler, Mackle contorts two parallel lines of highly-processed monophonic guitar samples, with each seemingly trying to clamber on top of the other at the same time.

With the drama of a coat-tailed concert pianist, Mackle begins with a single chord, which immediately proceeds to unravel in a staggering, punch-drunk procession of woozy mellotron-infused notes. Melodic sequences circle back and forth, over and around each other in a way that would seem to evoke a kind of sonic amnesia, if not for the relentlessly insistent way that these sequences seem to be clamouring for our attention.

Despite the spiralling, intertwining paths that each melodic line treads, there seems to be an inherent urgency for both to reach their destination. Each new phrase barrels forward with a dogged persistence that initially seems at odds with the many backtracks and digressions, but slowly but surely carves out its own inherent sense of logic. All too soon the destination is reached, and with a final emphatic flourish we find ourselves some distance from where we started out.

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Recorded by Billy Steiger
Mixed and mastered by Oli Barrett