mole harness

mole harness on radio 3, april 2003

mole harness is the instrumental project of james brewster, combining interlocking guitar melancholy with joyous synth melodies, ecstatic percussive rhythms and unsettling ambience. it began in late 2001 in Bristol, when he bought a second-hand sampler. the purchase completely changed his life, and mole harness is the result.

an initial live performance took place a few months later. the event was entitled ' "don't tell me to chill out" - an evening of uptight music', and took place in a basement venue resembling a sealed-off railway tunnel.

november 2002 saw the release of the debut ep 'problems with perspective' on silent age records. the cd came in a handmade cotton sleeve, each copy with a unique leaf silhouette cover print and dried leaf insert, and the title track was played on bbc radio 3's 'mixing it'. live appearances continued through 2003, gradually honing the material which would eventually become the debut album 'all your memories return at once'. this was released in march 2004 as a split between float and silent age records. It also came in a cotton sleeve, and each edition of 25 copies has a different cover print. the album was backed by more airplay on 'mixing it', as well as on xfm, classic fm, star fm, bbc liverpool and stations in canada, spain and australia.

mole harness performs live with the stripped-down setup of sampler and electric guitar, backed by the slide projections of jon williams. he has also worked with knowledge of bugs on two very different live collaborations. the first was their soundtrack to kenneth anger's1953 short film 'inauguration of the pleasuredome', performed both at the cube cinema in bristol and at the 2003 ashton court festival. the second took place at the museum of modern art in oxford in february 2004, and involved playing and looping acoustic instruments in a more improvised set.

mole harness has contributed tracks to both clean cut's 'cut your teeth' compilation and sink and stove records' 'hospital radio request list volume 2'. the next release will be a limited 3" cd on the japanese label universal frequencies, as part of their 'electric folklore' series. this collects together all the remaining tracks written on the original sampler, which has now been superseded by a computer.

work has already begun on an ep of new material for release later in the year.