Following previous albums exploring British coastal quicksands, shorelines, caves and forests, Dave Clarkson takes his recorder into faded seaside towns and fairgrounds (including Rhyl, New Brighton, Blackpool, Porthcawl, Northumberland, Margate and Hastings) and applies his production technique to the results. Some tracks are melodic and rhythmic while others are more desolate, capturing the unique fading atmosphere for the locations. Music was generated from the source sounds he recorded of penny falls, onboard rides, fairground organs, demolition noise, electrics and location ambience. One track (Spectral Pier Ballroom) is a spliced and stripped composite of three separate old musical recordings from his family archive, featuring his late father, grandmother and grandfather.

Contains natural source sound ingredients, some left pure, some processed, some mangled, some untangled. Field recordings at funfairs and coastal ghost towns, plus voices, instrumentation and electronics.

Location recordings plus composition, production, mastering, photography, sleeve design, packaging and coordination by Dave Clarkson at Cavendish House studios between December 2021 and September 2022.


REVIEWS:

"The rise and fall, then sometimes rise again, of British seaside towns has long been a topic of discussion in media, as well as amongst architects, urban designers, and those interested in understanding or making place. It’s easy to fall into tropes – the art biennial rescuing fortunes, the decline of marine industries, the rise of international travel, the faded Victorian glory…
Aware of these tropes, musician and producer Dave Clarkson set out to explore some of these towns, reading them in his own way – with sound. His new, limited-edition album A Pocket Guide to Dream Land: Faded Fairgrounds and Coastal Ghost Towns of the British Isles re-renders the towns as soundscapes, montages of found and newly recorded audio.
The artist visited seven coastal towns over the pandemic period, perhaps a time which only added to the haunted and otherly feeling seeping from the ten tracks on the album. He also folds in personal memory into the story, the track Spectral Pier Ballroom incorporating cutup moments of three musical recordings from his family archive, featuring his father, grandmother, and grandfather performing in seaside ballrooms over the 1970s and 80s.
Clarkson has previously considered place in his musical projects. Past albums explore quicksands, caves, shorelines, and forests. Here, the manmade is ever present on top of the natural backing sounds of seagulls, shoreline drifts, and passing winds. But the humanness present doesn’t just seem of this time – as seaside towns themselves carry the residue of the past, both collectively in their historical architectures jarring against the lights and imaginings of contemporary entertainments but also in our own childhood memories of place infused into the physical makeup of place.
The second track, Rollercoaster Ghost, speaks to this, with distorted, electronic screams conjuring up rollercoaster riders past and aurally projecting them into a landscape made of electronic gambling machines, arcades, and brightly illuminated modern technologies. It’s hauntological with a sense of anxiety, though later tracks temper that nervousness into a more melodic and hopeful reading of place.
T.S. Eliot famously sat in a seaside shelter in Margate overlooking the North Sea, writing some of the words which would go on to form his 1922 canonical poem The Waste Land, a poem built on loss, memory, fragmentation, and depth of reading as much as Clarkson’s album is.
It is said that as he sat there, overlooking the North Sea, from behind came the shrieking sounds of Dreamland amusement park, and that the sounds of thrillsters screaming conflated in Eliot’s creative process with the trauma and mourning of post-war, post-pandemic, and economic slumping that prefigures the mood of The Waste Land. New to the park was the Scenic Railway rollercoaster, a shallow big dipper and perhaps the screams and cheers from its riders wafted towards Eliot in the shelter, dislocated from the amusement park, somewhere between joy and terror, feeding into the Modernist project.
Such rides and parks also float up on Clarkson’s tracks, “music was generated from the sounds of penny falls, on-board rides, fairground organs” as well as the sounds of local ambience and demolition. For revival and reimagining can be a violent process, involving traumatic dispossession and largescale physical reshaping of places which may have set somewhat untouched for many decades.
The final track, Organ Transplant, speaks to this reshaping – layers of organ, clockwork ticking, silent ambience fold into one another giving way to what sounds like the distant noise of construction and architectural remaking. A new idea of place, formed of nostalgia and progression, often awkwardly squeezed into an existing situation, montaging into a complex collage".
recessed.space/00060-Dave-Clarkson-Dream-Land
Recessed Space, 15 Oct 2022

"Dave Clarkson is a gem who has flown under my—far from infallible—radar for about 30 years. There are upwards of 40 releases emanating in his impressive catalog, from the Cavendish House studio, including many of these Guides which have focused on everything from beaches, caves, forests, and lighthouses, with tangents to rain, ghost stories and illness. That another of his albums, For Horselover Fat by Eye In The Sky has a bash at honoring the concerns and creativity of the astonishing Philip K. Dick is right up my alley. I love everything about A Pocket Guide To Dreamland: the concept and how it sounds of course, but equally the perfect anorak-fetishistic packaging of the physical release with badges, a transparent orange cassette, postcards, and its cover label paying homage to Ordnance Survey maps above images depicting the almost psychedelic childlike thrill of a seaside funfair along with a gritty high rise apartment block tower. I almost expected some recreated cut-out coupons from The Eagle * comic for a day at Butlins Holiday Camp (Admit Family of 4 to unglamorous Skegness location). The recording is topped and tailed by tracks featuring a wheezing fairground organ (aptly appalling and eerily comforting in equal measure), and it is an album of two halves. The first half could serve as a brash snapshot of these coastal locations in their heyday with the annual influx of pleasure-seeking holidaymakers frantically rushing to disappointment. The title of the brief opening piece, "Organ Donor," clues us to the field-recording aspect of Clarkson's methodology but "Rollercoaster Ghost" soon shows the range of his production techniques, blending clattering rhythms, unbridled screams, and the calm resolution which can only come from the plucked strings of an acoustic guitar. His choices always work, whether sources are untouched, blended together, or processed to the point of virtual obliteration. On "Spectral Pier Ballroom," Clarkson patches together what sounds like demolition noise and the sound of crashing waves with three musical recordings of his late father and grandparents. A vivid sense is created of something being swept away, part the pathetic cruelty Pinky the pathetically cruel gangster from Brighton Rock and part the doomed unspoken romance of Mr Stevens and Miss Kenton from Remains of The Day, but brutal either way. The second half of this excellent album starts with "Penny Arcade in the Rain," where he makes something great from thunder, coins dropping into greedy game machines, a breezy, sweeping tempo, and a few mocking caws from seagulls. From that point a softer wave of memory washes gently back and forth. "Tiny Lights (Magic in a Child's Eyes)" is well titled, a sound reminder of why parents dragged themselves annually to these towns in the first place. Midway through the blissful "Coastal Ghost Towns," I had become an eight year old again, walking with our family friends along the seafront at night between Sutton-on-Sea and Mablethorpe, could literally feel my teeth crunching through the hard shell of a toffee apple and see my sister's mouth chasing the evaporating pink fluff of candy floss, while my father's irrepressibly exuberant voice somehow stands out over the waves crashing violently into the seawall.
[*The Eagle was also home to heroic Dan Dare and his alien nemesis The Mekon, the latter the inspiration for the group originally from Leeds.]"
Duncan Edwards, Brainwashed, 06 Nov 2022

"Prize winning for the longest title of a release in quite some time. Dave Clarkson is active with groups as Scissor Gun (with Alan Hempsall of Crispy Ambulance) and as Spectral Bazaar (with Ruth Davies). In his solo work, field recordings play an important role. He groups his recordings so there is a thematic approach, and it's no rocket science to know the music here is from fairgrounds and seaside towns. In ye olden days the go to place for a small holiday for the less rich rich. There are sounds of pennies dropping, board rides, fairground organs, demolition noise, electrics and location ambience - I am quoting the information here. Off hand I don't think I know anybody who works in the same way with field recordings as Clarkson. With him there is no pure documentation nor some delicate, lowercase, digital filtering and composing. Clarkson shapes and bends the material towards the world of electronic music, or, dare I call it, pop music. I admit I don't always know if all sounds used in these pieces are from field recordings, as at times I would think he adds synthesizers and drum machines. But, who knows, maybe they are fairground rides, cut short to form a rhythm? I am very pleased with this approach. The field recordings are a mere start, to get the show on the road (pun intended) and at times, the music is being right in the middle of a fairground, as in 'Sizzling Hot Dogs and Burnt Onions', but maybe a creepy one also. Because of the repetition involved, it seems like a never ending nightmare. Clarkson offers quite a bit of variation, with a bit of ambient ('Spectral Pier Ballroom') next to a jolly up tempo piece ('Penny Arcade In The Rain'). I like this odball combination of weird pop-like structures, ambience and field recordings, and the result being something unique. Certainly a route to explore further".
Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly, November 2022

"Manchester's Dave Clarkson has had fingers in so many pies over the last 30-odd years you will likely have encountered him on your musical travels. I'll chuck in that he's half of Scissorgun with Crispy Ambulance's Alan Hempsall and leave you and a search engine to explore.
I know Dave from a couple of releases - 'A Red Guide To The Coastal Quicksands Of The British Isles' and 'A Blue Guide To Shore Ghosts And Sea Mystery'. Indeed, there's my Electronic Sound review of 'A Blue Guide' pasted into the comments of the Discogs listing. "An unsettlingly powerful listen" I said, noting that 808 State's Graham Massey appears on sax/assorted percussion. Friends in high places is always a good sign. Dave really settled into a groove with this series of releases. There's 'Music For Lighthouses' (inspired by memories of Leasowe lighthouse on the North Wirral) followed by 'A Pocket Guide To Subterranea - Mysterious Caves Of The British Isles' and last year's 'A Pocket Guide To Wilderness - Deep Forests And Dark Woods Of The British Isles'. The titles speak for themselves. These are sonic explorations where field recordings are used as the foundations for Dave's musical nouse.
Here Dave heads to the funfair. You can almost taste the chaos of 'Sizzling Hot Dogs And Burnt Onions' as its rattling techno beat cracks along, while 'Penny Arcade In The Rain' is just... the title alone had me. It's a melodic rattler full of bright, dropping pennies and lever pulls and is so evocative of those long, wet holiday afternoons. There's very much a human touch here, and an empathy with the subject. It features sounds recorded in seven seaside towns rich in fading glamour. 'Spectral Pier Ballroom' is perhaps the centrepiece, made from three recordings featuring his late father, grandmother and grandfather performing in local ballrooms in the 70s and 80s. There's so much here to enjoy, but make sure you cast through his back catalogue too".
Neil Mason, Moonbuilding Magazine, Castles In Space Publishing, Autumn 2022

"After releases focused on the caves and coastal areas of Britain, Manchester's Dave Clarkson switches his attention to the fading arcades and promenades of towns such as Rhyl and Margate. Using augmented field recordings of attractions and carnivals, the tracks here are both nostalgic and noisy, as on the whooshing synths and euphoric shrieking of 'Rollercoaster Ghost", or the evocative “Penny Arcade In The Rain'. Spellbinding sonic postcards from a rapidly eroding seaside culture".
Mat Smith, Electronic Sound Magazine, November 2022

"Ashamed to admit I've never got around to one of Dave Clarkson's Pocket Guides until now. I enjoy field recordings and I was expecting field recordings. I wasn't expecting this... An affectionate, rave-tinged tribute to Britain's faded fairgrounds and coastal ghost towns. Reminds me of a time when a five pound note represented unlimited possibilities and everything seemed OK. Played it three times in a row".
Paul PMZ, TQ Magazine, November 2022

"Dave Clarkson is an artist based in Manchester, UK. Cavendish House (the label on which the album was released), is the musician's personal record company, created to realize ideas in music. A Pocket Guide to Dream Land is a large-scale electroacoustic creation, which was recorded in several British locations - Rhyl, New Brighton, Blackpool, Porthcawl, Northumberland, Margate and Hastings. Besides the use of electronics the main instrument of the musician was a recorder, on which a lot of field recordings were captured. Mysterious, atmospheric and sometimes nostalgic cyclic parts form a surprisingly rich soundscape, the tracks have a development, they are as diverse as possible. It is impossible not to deny the influence of the deconstructed club on Clarkson's sound, it becomes especially obvious while listening to the track Illuminations (Dirty Electricity). The care in drawing out the sonic details makes the plot even more fascinating and exciting. It was a great paradox to me how Dave was able to combine the dystopian feelings and the everyday mundane naturalness around us in the album. As a master manipulator of sounds, he ingeniously portrayed what an art connoisseur would call "real" and authentic".
Ilya Kudrin, Data Wave Webzine, December 2022


BROADCASTS:

'Sizzling Hot Dogs & Burnt Onions' on The Dark Train, Radio Warminster, 29 Sep 2022
'Organ Donor' on Space Is The Place' Radio,10 Oct 2022
'Rollercoaster Ghost' on The Dark Train, Radio Warminster, 13 Oct 2022
'Penny Arcade in the Rain' on Uptown Transmission 127, 14 Oct 2022
'Penny Arcade in the Rain' on Homebrew Electronica Show, 14 Oct 2022
'Rollercoaster Ghost' on Sonic Imperfections. ResonanceFM, London, 24 Oct 2022
'Penny Arcade in the Rain' on Gideon Coe, BBC6 Music, 24 Oct 2022
'Spectral Pier Ballroom' on The Polyhymnal, Camp Radio, 31 Oct 2022
'Coastal Ghost Towns' on It Came From Enclosure Three Radio, 06 Nov 2022
'Coastal Ghost Towns' on Seance Radio, 07 Nov 2022
'Coastal Ghost Towns' on New Auricular Shelter, Camp Radio, 10 Nov 2022
'Coastal Ghost Towns' on Steve Barker / On The Wire, BBC Radio Lancashire ,10 Dec 2022
'Rollercoaster Ghost' on Daniel Blumin, WFMU, New Jersey, 12 Dec 2022
'Penny Arcade in the Rain' on Steve Barker / BBC Sounds, 18 Dec 2022
'Tiny Lights (Magic in a Child’s Eyes)' on Space Is The Place' Radio, 29 Dec 2022
'Rollercoaster Ghost' on Freak Zone / Stuart Maconie, BBC6 Music, 04 Jun 2023
'Coastal Ghost Towns' on Cerys Matthews, BBC6 Music, 30 Jul 2023