Riffs Journal

08/09/2025

A heartfelt thank you to everyone who made our latest issue of Riffs — Volume 8, Issue 2: I Swear I Heard This — possible! Special thanks to our editors Nicholas Gebhardt and Asya Draganova for their dedication and hard work on this issue, and to Iain A. Taylor for the design throughout. The front cover was designed by Adam Williams, featuring a cover shoot photo by Ian Davies (2012–2025).

Explore the full issue here: https://riffsjournal.org/volume-8-issue-2-august-2025/

07/09/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2 — Check out Naomi Taylor’s “I Swear I Heard This… An otherworldly presence”!

“I swear I heard this creaking sound on the roof — at first I thought it was just the wind… there was such a gale blowing outside… but when the music…”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/naomi-taylor

🎤 About the author: Naomi Taylor is a Midlands4Cities-funded PhD student at Birmingham City University who is collaborating with the British Arts Festivals Association to look at the history of, and leadership and team dynamics in, arts festivals in the UK. She is also the founder and creative director of the Chiltern Arts Festival, which in 2025 completed its eighth season.

Naomi Taylor Naomi Taylor Citation: Naomi Taylor (2025) “I Swear I Heard This… An otherworldly presence“, Riffs: Experimental Writing on Popular Music 8(2): 33-34. Tweet Post navigation Previous PostDave KaneNext PostSam Riley August 15, 2025 Sarah Raine News Leave a comment

05/09/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2 — Check out Sam Riley’s “I Swear I Heard This… Noise Floor”!

“I kept hearing it. At first it was welcome. The harsh amplitudes of full sonic spectrum overloaded the speakers in the hall. Each vibration pulsed as much through my body as much as my ears, which had become saturated in the melee. And then, suddenly – just as it seemed we might feedback forever – the pummelling affects in my chest jolted from a frantic vacillation to stasis.”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/sam-riley/

🎤 About the author: Sam Riley is completing a PhD at the University of Birmingham. Their research tracks the cultural politics of music culture in Leningrad and St Petersburg through shifting infrastructures of late and post-socialism.

Sam Riley Sam Riley Citation: Sam Riley (2025) “I Swear I Heard This… Noise Floor“, Riffs: Experimental Writing on Popular Music 8(2): 31-32. Tweet Post navigation Previous PostNaomi TaylorNext PostUttaran Das Gupta August 15, 2025 Sarah Raine News Leave a comment

04/09/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2 — Check out Uttaran Das Gupta’s “I Swear I Heard This… FOMO and conspicuous consumption at music events in India”

“On a sunny day in December last year, I was late for a string quartet performance in the western Indian city of Panaji. The event was supposed to start at 5:30 p.m.; I arrived at the venue at 5:45 p.m. A notice outside the black-box venue — and polite volunteers — told me that I was too late: ‘No admission once the performance starts’. Despite a lifetime of being a journalist, I am yet to master the technique of forcing my way into events. So, I waited patiently outside, hoping for the event to end, when I could go in and, perhaps, meet some of the performers.”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/uttaran-das-gupta/

🎤 About the author: Uttaran Das Gupta is an Indian writer and journalist, and currently a PhD (Media) researcher at Birmingham City University. He has published a book of poems (Visceral Metropolis, 2017) and a novel (Ritual, 2020). His research focuses on Indian film, literature and culture.

Uttaran Das Gupta Uttaran Das Gupta Citation: Uttaran Das Gupta (2025) “I Swear I Heard This… FOMO and conspicuous consumption at music events in India“, Riffs: Experimental Writing on Popular Music 8(2): 29-30. Tweet Post navigation Previous PostSam RileyNext PostCraig Hamilton August 15, 202...

03/09/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2 — Check out Craig Hamilton’s “I Swear I Heard This…”

“I remember exactly where I was, and what I was doing. I was in the kitchen, washing up. I like washing up. It’s a process with a start and an end, and there is a sense of achievement provided by the evidence of your efforts. Clean plates where recently there was a mess and chaos. Like ordering your thoughts, and creating a clear argument that is convincing to others. Or writing something.”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/craig-hamilton-2/

🎤 About the author: Craig Hamilton is an independent scholar whose research explores contemporary popular music reception practices and the role of digital, data and Internet technologies on the business and cultural environments of music consumption.

Craig Hamilton Craig Hamilton 2 Citation: Craig Hamilton (2025) “I Swear I Heard This…”, Riffs: Experimental Writing on Popular Music 8(2): 26-28. Tweet Post navigation Previous PostUttaran Das GuptaNext PostAsya Draganova August 15, 2025 Sarah Raine News Leave a comment

02/09/2025

Check out Asya Draganova’s “I Swear I Heard This… Inspired by ‘Dark Windows’ by Rupert Hine” in the new issue of Riffs!

“I swear I heard this – the sound of thunder, the abrupt arrival of torrential rain, the picture of a day becoming dark as night for all but three, maybe three and a half minutes… or a lifetime, should I say? As I remember it so well, a yesterday from thirty years ago (or more). Wandering, wandering in the stormy foreign streets of the unknown: the future as imagined by a child. ‘Dark windows, ah, who would be a hero?’”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/asya-draganova-2/

🎤 About the author: Asya Draganova is a Senior Lecturer in Popular Music Culture and co-director of BA (Hons) Music Business at Birmingham City University. Some of the prominent themes in her research and publications include popular music and post-communist transitions in Bulgaria, subcultural music scenes, cultural alternativity, and the lived and metaphorical relationships between music and place in the Canterbury Sound and beyond.

01/09/2025

Check out Chris Mapp’s “I Swear I Heard This… I dream of Kelly” in the new issue of Riffs!

“I swear I heard this unbelievable version of the song I Will Always Love You, the one written by Dolly Parton and covered by Whitney Houston for The Bodyguard. I might describe something as ‘unbelievable’ after seeing an incredible performance or hearing an extraordinarily talented musician doing something goosebump-inducing. ‘Man, that gig was unbelievable!’ Or maybe as a way of expressing my dislike of a particular musical endeavour, ‘that was unbelievably bad’. Whether the moment I’m describing here was unbelievably good or unbelievably bad I’m not sure. I could probably argue it either way. However, the fact that this particular version happened was somewhat improbable to say the least. But it did happen.”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/chris-mapp-2/

🎤 About the author: Chris Mapp is Head of Music at the Music Centre, University of Warwick and a bass player, improviser, and composer. His research focuses on defining meaning making through the practice of writing about playing and playing about writing.

31/08/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2 — Check out Nicholas Gebhardt’s “I Swear I Heard This… Blow, Mo********er, Blow!”

“I swear I heard this. Or at least, I thought I did. There was so much noise in the club. More people than I’d ever seen before, all perched on chairs, tables, hanging off the window ledges; crammed in wherever they could find a space, some of them hanging on right up the stairs and squeezed out onto the street.”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/nicholas-gebhardt-2/

🎤 About the author: Nicholas Gebhardt is Professor of Jazz and Popular Music Studies at Birmingham City University. His research focuses on the histories, theories, cultures and practices of jazz and popular music, with particular emphasis on themes of the everyday, improvisation, collective practice, sonic experience, experimental writing and modernity.

30/08/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2 - Check out Juliane Deil’s “I Swear I Heard This… The Annual Reunion”

“I swear I heard this favourite band of mine perform in a tiny music venue in Brooklyn, New York, while the event that was actually going on was the annual reunion of all Welsh New Yorkers! The previous time I had seen Stereophonics perform was on their UK tour in November 2013 at the O2 Arena in London with seats right at the back, opposite of the stage, feeling lucky I had managed to find tickets for under £50. These are arguably the least desirable seats. At least to the far left or right of the stage you see the side-view of the musicians on stage, whereas on the opposite end to the stage, the figures become action figure size at best, with your eyes peeled to the screens.”

Read the full piece here: https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/juliane-deil/

🎤 About the author: Juliane Deil is a PhD student at Birmingham City University, researching music improvisation and music education. With a strong background in music performance, she completed a Master’s in jazz piano at Royal Birmingham Conservatoire in 2024, and a Bachelor’s degree in music at Durham University. Both confirmed her career interest in combining jazz and pedagogy research with music performance.

28/08/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2 — Sharonne Specker’s “I Swear I Heard This… ping pong duet”

“A chorale, then, or perhaps a madrigal, voices weaving in and out, in counterpoint, as the long, languorous notes of the alphorns joined in. Was that one, or two? Three? Four? Five?? Five. Five sonorous voices, layers of sound and reverberation, carrying faintly but firmly across the hill.”

Read the full piece here:
https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/sharonne-specker/

🎤 About the author: Sharonne Specker is an anthropologist with an interest in sound and sensory ethnography, identity and citizenship, collective memory and tradition, and creative research methodologies. Her doctoral studies at the University of St. Andrews explored the relationship between Swiss folk music and the learning of place, belonging, and homeland. Adjacent to her academic work, she has studied and taught classical voice.

Sharonne Specker Sharon Specker Citation: Sharon Specker (2025) “I Swear I Heard This… ping pong duet“, Riffs: Experimental Writing on Popular Music 8(2): 14-16. Tweet Post navigation Previous PostJuliane DeilNext PostLee Griffiths August 15, 2025 Sarah Raine News Leave a comment

27/08/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2

Check out Lee Griffiths’ “I Swear I Heard This… Swear I Hear This Ghost. Like, For Real”

“So, from the beginning. I decided to listen to the eponymous debut album by Chris McGregor’s Brotherhood of Breath for the first time in… longer than I can remember. It’s really good.”

Read the full piece here:�https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/15/lee-griffiths/

🎤 About the author:�Lee Griffiths is a saxophonist, promoter, and researcher who draws on his practice as a writer and musician to explore themes around improvisation, jazz, media, and culture. His doctoral project drew heavily on the philosophy of Karen Barad and he continues to explore a range of New Materialist themes and ideas.

Lee Griffiths Lee Griffiths 2 Citation: Lee Griffiths (2025) “I Swear I Heard This… Swear I Hear This Ghost. Like, For Real“, Riffs: Experimental Writing on Popular Music 8(2): 12-13. Tweet Post navigation Previous PostSharonne SpeckerNext PostEd McKeon August 15, 2025 Sarah Raine News Leave a...

26/08/2025

New from Riffs: Volume 8, Issue 2

Check out Ed McKeon’s “I Swear I Heard This… Discord Brag”

“@433 exhibition. no, it was a gig. well, it was a bit arty, so. anyhow, we were at the science museum and the floor was vibrating, the sound system was lit. the space was like the size of an olympic swimming pool and there were perhaps a dozen speakers on this balcony level, while the band, ensemble…whatever were exhibits in the centre, playing instruments that haven’t been heard together since the ‘70s, like the vcs4 and shozygs . and this was next to a soviet-era computer array, this huge wooden thing – the rugby tuning coil. but it was like the whole space was buzzing.”

Read the full piece here:�https://riffsjournal.org/2025/08/18/ed-mckeon-2/

🎤 About the author:�Ed McKeon is a Visiting Research Fellow at Birmingham School of Art and lectures at Goldsmiths, University of London. He writes on, researches, and produces new and experimental music and art, with a particular focus on curatorial theory and practice.

Ed McKeon Ed McKeon Citation: Ed McKeon (2025) “I Swear I Heard This… Discord Brag“, Riffs: Experimental Writing on Popular Music 8(2): 9-11. Tweet Post navigation Previous PostLee GriffithsNext PostBenjamin Torrens August 18, 2025 Sarah Raine News Leave a comment