Harkive

Welcome to Harkive 2020. Thanks for visiting the website and for showing an interest in the project. This post should tell you everything you may need to know about the project.

What is Harkive?

Harkive is an annual online research project that gathers stories about How, Where and Why people listen to music across a single day. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered around 10,000 stories, from people all over the world. This year Harkive takes place on Tuesday 21st July –  We’d love to hear your story.

The project is interested in how music plays its part in your day on 21st July. Which technologies, formats and services you use, the places you find yourselves in, how music accompanies you as you move through your day, and – of course – how music makes you feel.

How do I get involved?

Joining in with the project is easy. You can do so simply by adding the #harkive hashtag to your music-related posts on Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr. Alternatively, if you want to write something a little longer, you can email it to us, or send it via this online form. Stories are also accepted as posts on the Harkive Facebook wall.

To post here on Tumblr, simply add the #harkive hashtag to your post!

You can post as many entries as you like across the day, and you can write as much or as little as you like. Feel free to include photos, links and other digital media. There is more detailed information on how to tell your story here. You can also read some example posts that have been collected in previous years, from musicians, writers, technologists, promoters, and others.

Why does Harkive gather this information?

Harkive is part of ongoing research being undertaken by Craig Hamilton in the Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research at Birmingham City University. His research explores the cultural, technological, economic and social factors surrounding popular music consumption in the digital age, and his particular interest is the role digital, data and internet technologies play in the ways we listen. You can find more detailed information about the research ethics of this work here.

MyHarkive – new for 2020.

For Harkive 2020 we’re also launching the MyHarkive web app. This is interactive page will enable those who have posted stories to Harkive in previous years to explore their older posts. A lot can happen in 8 years, so we hope you enjoy looking back at how you listened during earlier Harkive days!

Once you’ve entered a username that creates a match in the Harkive database, you can then view the times of day you posted each year on the When you posted tab, or read your past stories on the What you said tab. Where available, links to your orginal posts – or media you shared (e.g. YouTube links, Spotify playlists) – are shown. These links will work as long as the original content is still online at that URL. The datatable view can also be re-organised by any of the columns, and you can search for particular words using the search box.

Need more information?

If you have any questions about Harkive, or the research surrounding it, please feel free to email [email protected] or say hello on Twitter (@harkive)

Join in!

Harkive is looking forward to once again hearing your stories this year. Please do consider joining in, and please do tell your friends, share this post, and generally spread the word.

Harkive is an online popular music research project that invites people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year. The aim of the project is to capture a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today.

On Tuesday 17th July, we hope you will tell Harkive the story of your music listening day. In this quick guide, you’ll find everything you need to know about joining other music fans around the world in adding to the 10,000 stories gathered by the project since it launched in 2013.

Why tell your story?

Millions and millions of people will be listening to music on 17th July, but no two people will listen in precisely the same way or for the same reasons. That makes your story interesting.

You might use certain products, services, formats and technologies that are common to many others. You might spend the day listening to the same radio station as millions of others. You might go to a gig, or hear music in a restaurant, or catch the hint of a song from the window of a passing car. Whatever your experience, or the situations you find yourself in as you listen, your experience will be unique. It is the unique nature of your story that we are trying to capture.

How, Where and Why you listen to music is fascinating – we’d like you to tell us all about it.

How to tell your story

Telling your story is easy, and you can tell it in a variety of ways. Hopefully there is one that suits your habits already, and you won’t need to go too far out of your way to do it.

You can post to social media platforms, such as Twitter, Instagram and here on Tumblr, simply by adding the #harkive hashtag to your posts throughout the day. Or you can ‘like’ the Harkive Facebook page and post something to our wall. You can post as many times as you like across the day.

If you’d like to take your time and write something a little longer, you can email your story to us, or post it via our online form.

A full list of the ways you can tell your story is available on the How To Contribute page.

What do Harkive stories look like?

The stories the project receives come in all shapes and sizes, from short tweets to long-form essays. The shortest story in the database has just 4 words, the longest has almost 4,000. If you need some inspiration, have a look at some of the Example stories we’ve gathered from musicians, journalists, academics and others in recent years.

Remember, though: there is no right or wrong way to tell your story. Just tell us, in your own words, about the role that music plays in your day on 17th July.

Have a look around online and get involved in conversations

Many regular Harkive participants comment that one of their favourite things about the day is reading the posts of others, or joining in with conversations with other participants. Some even discover new songs and artists through the project. Have a look on Social Media channels (especially Twitter, where most of the action seems to take place) by searching the #harkive hashtag.

If you do make some discoveries, and just for fun, why not add them to the Harkive Collaborative Playlist on Spotify. Click here to view that.

What happens to your contribution?

Harkive is part of ongoing post-doctoral research being undertaken by Craig Hamilton in the Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research at Birmingham City University. His research explores the cultural, technological, economic and social factors surrounding popular music consumption in the digital age, and his particular interest is the role digital, data and internet technologies play in the ways we listen. You can read more about that research, and explore the results of Craig’s analysis, by using the new Harkive Data Explorer application. You can find more detailed information about the research ethics of this work here.

As part of Craig’s research there is also a Music Listening Survey. It takes around 5-10 minutes to complete, and you can do this before or after 17th July. If you do not wish to complete the survey, don’t worry: you can still contribute your story on 17th July. If you’ve completed this survey in previous years, please do take another pass at it – it will be interesting to see if things have changed for you.

Please help us spread the word

We’d love to hear from as many people as possible on Tuesday 17th July, so if you think the project is interesting, please do tell your friends about Harkive and encourage them to join in. You can share this post with the following link: http://harkive.org/welcome-h18/

Ask us anything

If you have any questions about Harkive, or would like some guidance about how to tell your story, please feel free to email us, or say ask us on Twitter, where we are @harkive

Hi everyone,

Just a very quick note to say that Harkive 2018 will be taking place on Tuesday 17th July.

Harkive day 2017 has now ended. Thank you to everyone who told their music listening stories and to those who so kindly helped to spread the word about the project. As has been the case in previous years, it was a hugely enjoyable thing to run and the response was great. I hope that you enjoyed taking part also. Let’s do it all again next year!

I’d like to ask one more thing of you before you go….

The 2017 Music Listening Survey

I’d like to invite you to complete the 2017 Music Listening Survey, which takes around 5-10 minutes to complete. This asks questions about your music listening generally and your participation in Harkive. The data gathered by this survey will be crucial at the analysis stage of the project as it will provide important contextual data for the stories you have told. If you completed this survey in 2016, please do consider having another go. It will be interesting to see how responses have altered over the last 12 months.

You can still tell your story

If you didn’t manage to tell your story yet but would like to, remember that you can still email it to us, or use the form on the project site. Have a look at the instructions on the How To Contribute Page for more information. Story entries will be accepted until midnight (GMT) on 1st August 2017.

What happens Next?

The stories gathered yesterday will be collated, the data will be sorted and cleaned, and I’ll then have a better idea of the amount of stories received. I’ll post details of those numbers in the next week or two, but a conservative estimate at this stage is that their would appear to be in the region of around 1,000, which is about on a par with previous years.

Once the data is cleaned and sorted, and the results are gathered from the Listening Survey, the data will be added to that gathered in previous years and further analysis can begin later in 2017. In the immediate near future, I have to complete my thesis before the end of September and, as I’m sure you can understand, this will take priority. After that, though, I’ll be working on producing some online visualisations and interfaces that will display the stories and data gathered since 2013, along with the results of my analyses. Details of how that is progressing will be posted to the blog and links will be shared on Twitter and other social media channels. If you’d like to be involved with the analysis, or would like to collaborate with the project in some other way, please do get in touch.

Harkive is an annual online research project that gathers stories about How, Where and Why people listen to music across a single day. The project this year takes place on Tuesday 25th July –  We’d love to hear your story.

The project is interested in how music plays its part in your day on 25th July. We’re interested in the technologies, formats and services you use, the places you find yourselves in and how music accompanies you as you move through your day, and – of course – how music makes you feel.

Joining in with the project is easy. You can do so simply by adding the #harkive hashtag to your music-related posts on Twitter, Instagram and - of course - here on Tumblr. Alternatively, if you want to write something a little longer, you can email it to us, or send it via this online form. Stories are also accepted as posts on the Harkive Facebook wall.

You can send as many entries as you like across the day, and you can write as much or as little as you like. Feel free to include photos, links and other digital media. There is more detailed information on how to tell your story here.

Harkive is part of a PhD research project. You can read more about the background of that here, and find more detailed information about the research ethics of this work here. To further aid the research process, there is also an online survey. It takes around 5-10 minutes to complete, and you can do this before or after 25th July. If you do not wish to complete the survey, don’t worry: you can still contribute your story on 25th July.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email [email protected] or say hello on Twitter (@harkive)

Harkive day 2016 has now ended. Thank you to everyone who told their music listening stories and to those who so kindly helped to spread the word about the project. As has been the case in previous years, it was a hugely enjoyable day for us, and we hope you enjoyed taking part. We'd like to ask one more thing of you before you go....

The 2016 Music Listening Survey

We'd like invite you to complete the 2016 Music Listening Survey.

It takes around 5-10 minutes to complete, and asks questions about your music listening generally and your participation in Harkive. The data gathered by this survey will be crucial at the analysis stage of the project as it will provide important contextual data for the stories you told. Please do take a look:

SURVEY LINK: http://harkive.org/h16-survey/

What Happens Next?

The stories gathered yesterday will be collated, the data will be sorted and cleaned, and we'll then have a better idea of the amount of stories received. We'll post details of those numbers in the next week or so, but a conservative estimate at this stage is that their would appear to be in the region of 1,000, coming from places such as Australia, India, Japan, the UK, Germany, Spain, Norway, USA and others. Once the data is cleaned and sorted, and the results are gathered from the Listening Survey, the analysis stage will begin. Details of how that is progressing will be posted to the blog and links will be shared on Twitter and other social media channels about that. If you'd like to be involved with the analysis, or collaborate with the project in some other way, please do get in touch.

You can still tell your story

If you didn't manage to tell your story yet but would like to, remember that you can still email it to us, or use the form on the project site. Have a look at the instructions on the How To Contribute Page for more information. Story entries will be accepted until midnight (GMT) on 28th July 2016.

Without whom..

A huge thanks to Nick Moreton for all of his amazing work on the Harkive API and Data Visualisations. For the example stories that were posted to the blog in the countdown to Harkive 2016, a big thanks also to Rebecca Garnham (CarBoot Vinyl Diaries), John Jervis (WIAIWYA Records),  Johnny Doom (Kerrang! Radio), Andy Inglis (5000 Management), Claire Gevaux (Help Musicians UK), William Doyle (Your Wildernes Revisited), Kath and Giulia and the staff at Key Production, Colm Forde and Vanessa Lobon (Doc 'n Roll Film Festival), James Cherry (Sentric Music), and Juice Aleem. Thanks to Jamie East and team at Virgin Radio UK for having Harkive on the show and to Sarah Lay and Coral Williamson for the press articles. Thanks to Profs. Gebhardt, Wall and Long for their supervisory guidance, to BCMCR colleagues for support and encouragement, and to M3C for their support of this project. Finally, of course, a big thank you once again, to all the people who told their stories.

and finally

Harkive 2017

Harkive will be back again next year, on another sunny day in July, for what will be our 5th year. Please do join us again. In the meantime, Harkive will be posting stories throughout the year here on the project site and will be releasing new episodes of the Harkive Podcast.  If you'd like to suggest stories for the site, or themes for the podcast, drop us a line or say hello on Twitter. Stay tuned, in other words.

Harkive is an annual online research project that gathers stories about How, Where and Why people listen to music across a single day.

The project this year takes place on Tuesday 19th July -  We'd love to hear your story.

You can join in by adding the #harkive hashtag to your music-related posts on Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr.

Alternatively, you can email your story to us, or send it via this online form. Stories are also accepted as posts on the Harkive Facebook wall.

You can write as much or a little as you want, and send as many entries as you like.

There will be some live Data Visualisations on 19th July, powered by Harkive's API. You'll be able to see the number of stories told, and where in the world they have come from.

Harkive is part of a PhD research project. You can read more about the background of that here, and find more detailed information about our research ethics here.

To further aid this research, we invite you to complete our 2016 Music Listening Survey. It takes around 5-10 minutes, and will help us produce data that looks like this.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email [email protected] or say hello on Twitter (@harkive)

Finally, please do consider joining in on Tuesday 19th July by telling Harkive your story.

On Tuesday 19th July Harkive will return for its fourth year to once again collect stories online from people about the detail of their music listening experience.

The project asks people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year, with the aim of capturing for posterity a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered over 8,000 stories, and on Tuesday 19th July we’ll be doing it all again. We hope you’ll join us by telling Harkive your story. You can read our quick guide to the project here.

We’re now on the final countdown to Harkive 2016, with just 1 day to go. As we have done in previous years, in the run up to the big day we’ll be posting some ‘example’ stories from people who do interesting things with their music listening. Today, for our final Harkive 2016 example we welcome Juice Aleem.

A mainstay of the UK hip hop scene, Juice has released singles and LPs on NinjaTune and Big Dada, collaborating and touring with the likes of Luke Vibert and Coldcut along the way. He returns with a new LP in 2016, "Voodu Starchild", featuring contributions from Mike Ladd, Roots Manuva, Blackitude and more. Lead single "Warriors" is available as a free download from label Gramma Proforma here.

Juice kindly agreed to tell Harkive the story of his music listening day, and here it is.

Music is a thing that has always been there for me.

Certain feelings and memories of mine are placed in the context of songs or genres that have moved me. Moving me.

Preparing to move house again brings on a lot of reflection. And in that sense, there are tunes that will always transport me to other places, reminding me of friends, family and lovers.

Gil Scott Heron's 'The Bottle' will always take me the 'Rare Groove' era of places such as West End Bar in Birmingham. Searching for these records and really having a 'discovery' of artists that were not only as exciting as the current scene but also had immense amounts of back catalog was really a joy.

The joy would make us feel connected to a deeper history of popular culture, like we were more clued up than everybody else. That special energy of youth is fueled by secret knowledge. Further into my Hip Hop awareness I'd see more and more of the records that my parents owned. That was and is still a real special thing that cannot be replaced. My parents aren't here anymore, and the knowledge that all I need do is put on a Dennis Brown or Ijahman record to help bring good thoughts of my mother is a real jewel. My father passed a longer time ago in the States, but a few James Brown songs fire the memory cards up nicely. I imagine how the both of them would react to me playing their music and smile.

Over the last few months I've become a lot more pro with my collections. Through the years, thousands of comics, mixtapes, soundtapes, books, films and records have been crammed into very small spaces for the sake of future entertainment. And to show my now full grown adult responsible self I decided to take the strain off of a few of these tiny black holes and buy decent containers for all these records.

Pretty much every record I own has meaningful history attached to it. I don't own as many as sum but as they line up in boxes across the wall, I tend to think of a different future where tech didn't get smaller with CDs and MP3s but a place where the USB keys are these 12 and 7 inch records. The times and the emotions etched into the records are so much bigger than can be contained and I still love allowing them to roam through the air every now and then.

They have earned the release because they have always been there for me.

This isn't the place I was born or where I spent the most time but it is where formative years were grown. It means sumthing to live in a place, have to leave, and only have these reflections as reminders.

Even once I finally leave the bedroom I grew up in, these special memories will still be here, at home.

If you enjoyed Juice’s example and would like to tell your own Harkive story in a similar way, you can do so by emailing [email protected] on or after 19th July with the tale of your listening day, writing as much or as little as you want. If email is not your thing, you can contribute your story in a number of other ways, such as by Tweeting with the hashtag #harkive across the day, by posting to the Harkive page on Facebook, or by adding stories and images to Tumbr and Instagram – just remember to add the hashtag #harkive to each of your posts. More information on the ways in which you can tell your story are on the How To Contribute page.

On Tuesday 19th July Harkive will return for its fourth year to once again collect stories online from people about the detail of their music listening experience.

The project asks people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year, with the aim of capturing for posterity a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered over 8,000 stories, and on Tuesday 19th July we’ll be doing it all again. We hope you’ll join us by telling Harkive your story. You can read our quick guide to the project here.

We’re now on the final countdown to Harkive 2016, with just 2 days to go. As we have done in previous years, in the run up to the big day we’ll be posting some ‘example’ stories from people who do interesting things with their music listening. Today we welcome James Cherry, Broadcast Manager for independent music publisher Sentric Music.

Based in Liverpool and with staff across Europe, Sentric provides artists with a variety of music business services connected to rights management, including royalty collection and synchronisation. Alongside his role of Broadcast Manager, James also focuses on content management, giving artists the help they need to establish themselves in an increasingly competitive market. You can find out more about Sentric Music on their website, or you can follow them on Twitter.

James kindly agreed to keep a record of his music listening for Harkive, and here is his story.

7.16 - I'm up and out to the gym early, my Discover Weekly playlist on Spotify refreshed so I throw that on. It usually provides a few gems, and this week is no different. Zibra's 'Flat in Dagenham' and Gordi's 'So Here We Are' are the standouts.

7.41 - I arrive at the gym, removing my headphones Jess Glynne's 'Don't Be So Hard On Yourself' is playing over their internal radio as I head to the changing room.

7.47 - Heading into the actual gym I put my gym playlist on through Spotify. It's one of my oldest playlists that I've curated over five years, a solid blend of high tempo pop, heavier indie rock mixed with traces of hip-hop. Duke Dumont's latest 'Ocean Drive' transitions to Talib Kweli's 'Get By' to Spring King's 'City'. It might not be for everyone, but it works for me.

8.50 - Discover Weekly is back on for the 20-minute walk to the office, not too much to report here I skip quite a few of the tracks. I'm not overly impressed with this second listening session , so I eventually turn it off and remove my headphones.

9.10 - Stop off at the local spar to pick up some milk for the office. Justin Timberlake's 'Can't Stop This Feeling' is on the radio, that's a track I've heard played to death over the last month so I let out a sigh.

9:46 - We've made it to work, and as I'm out for the afternoon I'm keen to crack on with my backlog of emails. It's headphones on and hit play on Spotify's 'Music For Concentration' playlist. As I get older I'm finding myself listening to more and more music designed for focus.

10:42 - Emails completed we are headphones down and back in the room. What I find out to be Spotify's One Week One playlist is on the Office Sonos. Can't say I take much interest but Kant's 'Close to the Wire' and Bob Marley & the Wailers 'Is This Love - Remix' perk my ears.

13:48 - It's our regular A+R meeting at Sentric where we run through all of the latest exciting artists and bands that have joined recently. We have over a hundred to run through, so there is no messing about. We skip between Spotify, Soundcloud and iTunes to listen to the latest offerings. Standouts came from Litany, Old Sea Brigade, Mullally and Benedict Benjamin.

16:38 - Back in the office for the final part of the day and Nancy Sinatra's album 'Nancy & Lee' is on the Sonos.  I only catch the final track 'I’ve Been Down So Long'.

17:05 - The office is starting to thin out so I put my '2016' Spotify playlist on the Sonos. I've created a yearly playlist since 2010, it's a great way to track the evolution of my music taste, and pinpoint the key tracks in my life's soundtrack. A track qualifies for the playlist if I listen to it over three times and still like it. Basic I know, but it works for me.

Xam Volo's 'Rescue Me', Stealth's 'Judgement Day' and St. Lucia's 'Dancing On Glass' kick things off.

17:11 - Still in the office, I notice a former Sentric band The Hunna are playing a Facebook live stream for Billboard in New York so I pop my headphones on to catch 'Bonfire'.

17:36 - Still in the office, I realise I've been listening to silence with my headphones on, so I take them off and catch Chairlift's 'Polymorphing' and Kano's 'This Is England' off my 2016 playlist before calling it a day.

19.57 - Back home, I stick the telly on to catch the Italian football team singing their national anthem.

20.34 - While watching the football my girlfriend, Louise walks in from the kitchen and proceeds to serenade me with Craig David's Live Lounge cover of Justin Bieber's 'Love Yourself'.

If you enjoyed James' example and would like to tell your own Harkive story in a similar way, you can do so by emailing [email protected] on or after 19th July with the tale of your listening day, writing as much or as little as you want. If email is not your thing, you can contribute your story in a number of other ways, such as by Tweeting with the hashtag #harkive across the day, by posting to the Harkive page on Facebook, or by adding stories and images to Tumbr and Instagram – just remember to add the hashtag #harkive to each of your posts. More information on the ways in which you can tell your story are on the How To Contribute page. Visit the Harkive website for more information.

Harkive 2016 is just 2 days away. We do hope you’ll join us on Tuesday 19th July by telling us the story of your listening day. If Harkive sounds interesting, please do help us spread the word by telling your friends about the project. In the meantime you can keep an eye on the project by following us on Twitter, or by liking our Facebook page. If you have any questions about the project please feel free to email us.

On Tuesday 19th July Harkive will return for its fourth year to once again collect stories online from people about the detail of their music listening experience.

The project asks people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year, with the aim of capturing for posterity a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered over 8,000 stories, and on Tuesday 19th July we’ll be doing it all again. We hope you’ll join us by telling Harkive your story.

We’re now on the final countdown to Harkive 2016, with just 3 days to go. As we have done in previous years, in the run up to the big day we’ll be posting some ‘example’ stories from people who do interesting things with their music listening. Today we welcome Vanessa Lobon and Colm Forde, the good people behind Doc'n Roll Films.

Doc’n Roll Films was set up in 2013 to build a nation-wide platform for the distribution and exhibition of alternative music documentaries. Focused primarily on first and second time filmmakers, Vanessa and Colm provide support and guidance through the industry’s maze. Based in London, with an annual autumn festival of premiere films across the city’s independent cinemas, they are gradually branching out to the regional cities with weekend editions in Brighton, Manchester and Liverpool.

After meeting with Harkive at Liverpool Sound City earlier this year, Vanessa and Colm kindly agreed to keep a record of their music listening day. Here is their story.

A regular day for the core Doc’n Roll team – Colm Forde (Programmer) and Vanessa Lobon (Artistic Director)

Alarm goes off, it’s 8:15

Another hectic day ahead, as we’re entering the build up period to our annual festival in November.

First thing,…on with the radio - Shaun Keaveny’s 6 Music show.

He sounds little bit grumpy today but good tunes to start the day, Roisin Murphy’s “Ten Miles High”, The Smiths “What difference is it makes”, White Denim “Had 2 know”…

Breakfast, showers and we are ready for work,….from home today.

Sifting through and answering emails we’ve still got the radio on 6, with Lauren Laverne,….ESG’s Erase You a particular favourite,…‘til 12pm….when we start to listen to a great show off RTE Radio 1 player. The South Wind Blows, from Philip King of Other Voices festival, is a weekly Saturday evening show broadcast from Dingle, in Kerry,....well worth exploring!

His one-hour programme has a great selection of folk/rock tunes,.. Bob Dylan, The Waterboys, The Beatles, Lisa Hanigan. A cool mix of old and new bands. Where I was first exposed to The National, Laura Muluva, Villagers…

Colm is the cook, so while he is prepping he’s got 6 Music on the kitchen radio in the background.

I’ve decided to listen to one of our recently acquired albums as I’m still working in the office, Car Seat Headrest –Teens of Denial,… American indie rock. It’s a grower, been hearing a lot recently about these guys.

Once lunch is over, we’re both back to researching and sorting through social media leads on docs being released in 2017. One of these ‘in-production films’ profiles the early days of the UK Hip-Hop scene,….so for a change of mood, out comes my Gangster’s Chronicle: Best of London Posse album for some good witty early 90’s street poetry.

An email update on the progress of a great doc on the horizon called Northern Disco Lights: The Rise and Rise of Norwegian Dance Music, inspires a search through our vinyl for a taste of Röyksopp’s Melody AM album.

The latest draft of our festival poster design arrives, so we consult via Skype with our designer on what’s good, what needs tweaking…..

Another quick search through Mixcloud for a soundtrack to this task and where off with a classic Norwegian cosmic disco set, Prinz Thomas’ et al, ending 45 minutes later with an impromptu boogie as Todd Terje’s Inspector Norse hits….

Dinnertime,….radio is on again, prepping to 6 Music, Marc Riley’s selection is a ritual, as his live sessions and general banter shake the evening and mood up a little.

As evening tilts towards night, we pick a new music doc from our to-watch list. It’s almost a nightly occurrence these days, as we’re currently swamped with a backlog of 11 films waiting in-line.

This is a great opportunity for us to discover new bands, broaden our knowledge and learn about some music genres that we are not overly familiar with, like jazz or metal. This exposure to new sounds often leads us to new album discoveries via Youtube, Soundcloud, Spotify….etc.

We end the day listening a few albums on our record player.

A good selection of down-tempo tunes from Bill Wither’s Greatest Hits, The Shins’ Wincing the Night Away,,..closing with Yo La Tengo’s And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside (over and) Out….

If you enjoyed Vanessa and Colm’s example and would like to tell your own Harkive story in a similar way, you can do so by emailing [email protected] on or after 19th July with the tale of your listening day, writing as much or as little as you want. If email is not your thing, you can contribute your story in a number of other ways, such as by Tweeting with the hashtag #harkive across the day, by posting to the Harkive page on Facebook, or by adding stories and images to Tumbr and Instagram – just remember to add the hashtag #harkive to each of your posts. More information on the ways in which you can tell your story are on the How To Contribute page. Full details can be found on the project website: www.harkive.org

Harkive 2016 is just 3 days away. We do hope you’ll join us on Tuesday 19th July by telling us the story of your listening day. If Harkive sounds interesting, please do help us spread the word by telling your friends about the project. In the meantime you can keep an eye on the project by following us on Twitter, or by liking our Facebook page. If you have any questions about the project please feel free to email us.

On Tuesday 19th July Harkive will return for its fourth year to once again collect stories online from people about the detail of their music listening experience.

The project asks people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year, with the aim of capturing for posterity a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered over 8,000 stories, and on Tuesday 19th July we’ll be doing it all again. We hope you’ll join us by telling Harkive your story.

We’re now on the final countdown to Harkive 2016, with just 4 days to go. For the past few days we've been posting example stories from interesting people involved with popular music - check back through the blog to see these - but for today we've got something slightly different for you, from the good people at Key Production.

Key Production is a well-established music & media manufacturer. They have been manufacturing CDs, DVDs, vinyl and print for over 25 years, specialising in bespoke packaging and project management for the music industry. If you've bought records, CDs or DVDs by UK artists at some point over the last decade or so, there's a fair chance it was made by Key Production.

Harkive originally approached Key in order to see if someone at the company would be interested in writing a Harkive story for the blog, much like the ones you've been reading here this week. Key thought it would be interesting, however, to see how the company’s employees as a whole enjoy music in and outside of the workplace.

This development was good news for us, as for 2016 we have an additional element to our research process. Alongside gathering stories on Tuesday 19th July, we have also devised a Music Listening Survey. The data gathered by this survey is intended to augment the stories gathered on 19th July and provide additional context for the analysis stages. The survey is now live at http://www.harkive.org/h16-survey and takes around 5-10 minutes to complete. Whether you intend to take part in Harkive 2016, we hope that you will take the survey, and also hope, of course, that you will enjoy completing it.

Working with Key has allowed us to road-test the survey. They took elements of it - specifically the sections on General Music Listening, Technology & Formats, and Recommendation & Discovery - and circulated it amongst their staff, which has led to the following infographic that provides a fascinating insight into the listening habits and practices of a group of people who work with music on a daily basis.

By completing the Harkive 2016 Music Listening Survey, we hope you will help us to produce similarly interesting insights into the practices and opinions of the those contributing their stories to Harkive.

There are just 4 days to go until Harkive 2016, and we do hope you’ll join us on Tuesday 19th July by telling us the story of your listening day. You can contribute your story in a number of other ways, such as by Tweeting with the hashtag #harkive across the day, by posting to the Harkive page on Facebook, or by adding stories and images to Tumbr and Instagram – just remember to add the hashtag #harkive to each of your posts. More information on the ways in which you can tell your story are on the How To Contribute page.

If Harkive sounds like something your friends may be interested in, please do help us spread the word by telling them about the project. In the meantime you can keep an eye on the project by following us on Twitter, or by liking our Facebook page. If you have any questions about the project please feel free to email us.

Thank you to all at Key Production for working with us on this element of our research. You can follow their activities on Twitter, where they are @keyproduction, or visit their website to find out how they can help with your physical product needs.

We'll have another story tomorrow as the countdown to Harkive 2016 continues.

Methodological notes / statement from Key Production:

29 people within Key Production completed the survey anonymously via Survey Monkey. The data was then analysed with the aid of Survey Monkey reports and Microsoft Excel, then translated into graphs enriched with artworks in order to create the infographic above. Not all the 42 questions were included in the analysis. Upon request, will be happy to provide you with the full questionnaire and statistics.

One of the main challenges of the PhD project that Harkive is part of, is the need to devise a means by which the insights held within the stories people have told the project since 2013 may be revealed.  The largely text-based data collected represents a huge challenge in that regard, leading to a methodological focus on collaborative and experimental analytical methods. Such an approach is by no means unique to this project. Academic researchers in a number of disciplines have been embracing new methods and experimental approaches for several years, leading to the genesis of entirely new fields: Social Computing; Digital Humanities; Cultural Analytics. At the same time, barriers to entry and access in terms of data collection, storage and analysis, are falling, enabling people to critically and artistically engage with data in interesting ways. Think of terms such as Citizen Data Science, or movements such as The Quantified Self.

Harkive and the doctoral research project that underpins it, resides somewhere within the broad and emerging area described above. What makes this exciting for the project is that, just as the landscape of modern popular music is a fascinating and dynamic space, so – increasingly – is the field of human-data interaction.

To put all of this another way, just as the stories Harkive collects are ‘crowd-sourced’, one avenue this project is keen to explore is to see if perhaps some of the analysis may come from a similar method. What questions would other people like to ask of this data? What could be built with it? What would it sound like as a piece of music? These are the questions that come from having an inquiring mind and an interesting data set! There are more possibilities and questions than there is time, however, and it is with this in mind that we have created the Harkive API, full details of which are provided below.

For those of you reading who may be unaware of the function of an API (Application Programming Interface), in simple terms it allows access to data in a structured, reliable way, so that applications, visualisations and other online tools (and even pieces of music) can potentially be created by making use of the data. The crucial point is that although the data held within an API may change over time, the structure the data is held within remains constant. This means that anything built upon an API is able to change dynamically in line with changes in and to the data, without necessarily having to change its own structural dynamics. APIs are thus powerful tools for developers and, increasingly, academic researchers.

Data Visualisations created with Harkive API

A better way to understand the above is to look at the small number of visualisations that have been built by Nick Moreton using the Harkive API. These are being hosted on a dashboard at www.harkive.com and relate to the Harkive 2016 data. This data is and will be dynamic – as people tell their stories, they will generate more data – but the structure of the API remains the same. Because the visualisations on www.harkive.com are built with the API, they will change as more stories are gathered.

Here are some examples:

Story Sources: will display the ratio of total stories according to the various submission methods. For a full list of the available story-telling methods, please visit the How To Contribute page. From the screenshot below, it is easy to see the dominance of Twitter in terms of conversations about Harkive, but these ratios may change on 19th July as stories begin to be posted elsewhere.

Harkive Around The World: will display details of Tweets sent with the #harkive hashtag, where Twitter users have enabled location settings.

WordCloud: Following automatic removal of Stopwords and other phrases (incl. the word Harkive, which features prominently in collected posts), this visualisation will produce a Wordcloud based on the content of Harkive stories. As the screenshot below shows, ‘tell’ is a prominent word at this point in time, and this is because of the promotional posts (and shares of those posts) encouraging people to ‘tell their story’ to Harkive.

The basic examples above demonstrate some of the many ways that different levels of insight can be derived from data. They represent, however, only the tip of the iceberg of what is possible.

Shortly after the 2016 story-gathering element of the project ends next week, we will begin the process of sorting, cleaning and analysing the data. For the purposes of the immediate concern of the PhD project Harkive forms the basis of, this analysis will proceed according to three broad themes: Formats and Technology; Data, Privacy, Identity and Ownership; Recommendation and Discovery.

If you would like to get involved with this process please do contact [email protected]. There are already a small number of academic researchers, analysts and data scientists working on ideas for the data, so please do consider collaborating with us.

If, on the other hand, you would simply like to play with the API and the data it contains in order to create something cool – perhaps even a piece of music? – then please do so. Just remember to let us know what you come up with so that we can share it with the wider Harkive audience.

Have fun!

Further information on the Harkive API

Documentation is available at http://developer.harkive.com.

The Harkive API allows developers access to limited elements of the data collected by The Harkive Project. In particular, and based on the Research Ethics underpinning the project, the API does not provide access to personal information gathered by the project.

The API currently contains only stories collected by the 2016 instance of Harkive. Stories from 2013-2015 will be retrospectively added shortly after Harkive 2016.

On Tuesday 19th July Harkive will return for its fourth year to once again collect stories online from people about the detail of their music listening experience.

The project asks people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year, with the aim of capturing for posterity a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered over 8,000 stories, and on Tuesday 19th July we’ll be doing it all again. We hope you’ll join us by telling Harkive your story.

We’re now on the final countdown to Harkive 2016, with just 5 days to go. As we have done in previous years, in the run up to the big day we’ll be posting some ‘example’ stories from people who do interesting things with their music listening. Today we welcome musician William Doyle.

After releasing two acclaimed albums as East India Youth, William is now heading up your wilderness revisited, a multimedia art project that looks at how we interact and engage with British post-war suburban environments, specifically new places built in the last 30 years, while also considering the challenge of their designs for the future. The project focuses on the questions and concerns of human individuality within the suburban built environment, and how the development of these places affects the harmony - both socially and ecologically - that is sought within them. The work of your wilderness revisited will eventually be compiled into an audio/visual exhibition that will include photography, video art and music working together to create a unique look at our surroundings, and to inspire discussion to help people better engage with their own.

William kindly agreed to keep a record of his music listening one day earlier this month, and here is his story.

I start every morning by doing around 20 to 30 minutes meditation, and then will often sit afterwards and listen to one or two songs on headphones and just focus on them, letting them help the day begin. This morning I listen to ‘Blackpool Late Eighties’ by James Holden, from his album The Inheritors, an album which only seems to improve upon each listen. It’s really one of the greatest released in the last decade, and I find the spaciousness and depth of the production on it to be transportive and inspiring.

I then head downstairs and do the washing up. This is a routine I’m enjoying at the moment since the washing up is fairly low concentration job and so I can really hone in what I’m listening to. Today I opt for the radio. I’ve been a big BBC 6 Music listener for the last 8 or 9 years now, although my frequency of listening habit will fluctuate. Starting the day listening to Shaun Keaveny’s breakfast show is almost guaranteed to make me laugh or smile and you can’t really ignore the positive effect this has on the rest of your day.

This morning’s highlights over an hour of listening are ‘Customer Service’ by Jurassic 5 (which I’ve heard twice recently so I’m guessing it’s new?), ‘Silvering’ by Lonelady, ‘Here Comes The Breeze’ by Gomez (which I don’t really enjoy, but I do when impersonating the singer with the higher-pitched bluesy voice), the new Róisín Murphy tune ‘Ten Miles High’, and ‘Life Itself’ by Glass Animals (which has some really strange lyrics.) The last tune I leave on is Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve’s ‘Black Crow’ featuring the wonderful Holly Miranda on vocals. It reminds me that I need to listen to the BTWS album as everything I’ve heard so far has been brilliant, and so I decide to set aside time later to dive in. My good friend Hannah Peel contributed vocals over this album and ‘Diagram Girl’ is one of my favourite songs in the last year.

Next I finish watching ‘I Often Dream of Trains In New York’ which is a live recording of Robyn Hitchcock playing his classic album ‘I Often Dream of Trains’ accompanied by guitarist Tim Keegan and multi-instrumentalist Terry Edwards, who seems to be cropping up a lot in my musical thoughts lately (I’m a big fan Terry, if you’re reading!). The reason I’m watching this is for research as I want to do a piece of writing on this album. It’s been hugely influential to me over the years and it has been even more so recently. I think it’s a generally overlooked wonder. The film is great as well, with interview snippets in between some songs that shed some insight into the history of the album.

The most music I listen to after this point is all of my own. I’m working on a lot of music at the moment and try to dedicate 7 or 8 hours daily to this. This doesn’t sound like much time but with some focus over 2 hour increments, you wind up getting a lot done without becoming tired and frustrated. Tiredness and frustration lead me to tinkering and making useless changes, listening to the same part over and over again, so a concentrated period is better than an endlessly sprawling one.

Today the results of the Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq war are published. I listen to ‘Harrowdown Hill’ by Thom Yorke. Chills. Through the filter of everything that’s been going on, the song’s tone of an acknowledged darkness feels strong even outside of the context of the lyrics. This feeling catches me off-guard for a moment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrowdown_Hill

I listen to Beyond The Wizard Sleeve’s album The Soft Bounce in the bath. Slightly misjudged the setting for it, but the sound of it is incredible. Going to give it some more goes tomorrow, but I think they’ve made a winner.

Today, after recalling some kind of industrial dub atmosphere lodged deep in my memory and after a bit of searching, I remember that producer Adrian Sherwood had something to do with a track that had an effect on me at some point. I’d only heard it once but remember it vividly for some reason. This is quite a common occurrence for me, however I rarely note things down at the time as I prefer them to be held in that moment as much as possible, and if they return to me later then it’s a fun experiment to try to uncover it. It takes me a while to search through Sherwood’s massive discography but the track turns out to be ‘Fade Away’ by New Age Steppers, which was the first single released on his On-U Sound label. I then spend 45 minutes listening to the self titled album that it features on and I’m pleased to have uncovered this right now. I think I’ve been unconsciously adding dub-like effects to drum machine parts in some new songs I’m working on, so it’s nice to hear some sonic ideas in this context that I could perhaps go further on.

Finish the day, as I often do, with a play on Brian Eno and Peter Chilver’s Trope app. Final thought: We need more generative music.

If you enjoyed William’s example and would like to tell your own Harkive story in a similar way, you can do so by emailing [email protected] on or after 19th July with the tale of your listening day, writing as much or as little as you want. If email is not your thing, you can contribute your story in a number of other ways, such as by Tweeting with the hashtag #harkive across the day, by posting to the Harkive page on Facebook, or by adding stories and images to Tumbr and Instagram – just remember to add the hashtag #harkive to each of your posts. More information on the ways in which you can tell your story are on the How To Contribute page.

Harkive 2016 is just 5 days away. We do hope you’ll join us on Tuesday 19th July by telling us the story of your listening day. If Harkive sounds interesting, please do help us spread the word by telling your friends about the project. In the meantime you can keep an eye on the project by following us on Twitter, or by liking our Facebook page. If you have any questions about the project please feel free to email us.

On Tuesday 19th July Harkive will return for its fourth year to once again collect stories online from people about the detail of their music listening experience.

The project asks people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year, with the aim of capturing for posterity a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered over 8,000 stories, and on Tuesday 19th July we’ll be doing it all again. We hope you’ll join us by telling Harkive your story.

We’re now on the final countdown to Harkive 2016, with just 6 days to go. As we have done in previous years, in the run up to the big day we’ll be posting some ‘example’ stories from people who do interesting things with their music listening. Today we welcome Claire Gevaux, Creative Director of Help Musicians UK.

Help Musicians UK is the leading UK charity for professional musicians of all genres, from starting out through to retirement. They help at times of crisis, but also at times of opportunity, giving people the extra support they need at a crucial stage that could make or break their career. You can find out more about their work by visiting their website, or following them on Twitter.

Claire kindly agreed to keep a record of her music listening on Thursday 7th July for Harkive, and here is her story.

7.38

Waking up in a hotel room in Liverpool, the morning after the night before, and the strangely appealing Paranoid Android from the Radiodread album by Easy Star All Stars is still floating around my head. There aren’t any clever devices for playing music in the room, so I resort to Radio 6 Music on the TV – I wonder if Shaun Keaveny would like my earworm this morning.   First Aid Kit starts my day with a silver lining and a decaf coffee.

9.57

Leaving the Albert dock, I walk across Liverpool listening to Mendelsohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream as I had the privilege of sitting in on a rehearsal with the Hallé Orchestra and I was fascinated to hear and watch Sir Mark Elder’s precise direction of the whispering passage in the first movement. It also brings to mind the recent celebration of Shakespeare’s death and the relationship between music and other artforms and in telling the stories of our lives.

11.01

By late morning, I arrive at my destination, Milpafest, Britain’s leading Indian Art Development Trust, based at Liverpool Hope University. Alok Nayak, Artistic Director, tells me about his organisation which educates, promotes and trains people of all ages in Indian arts. Although based in Liverpool, it is national in its reach and international in its outlook, and can take credit for creating its own sub-genre influenced by film and other artforms as well as contemporary life in Britain. We talk about the challenges for artists to achieve long term, sustainable careers in Indian Music, with few making it as international soloists but that there are routes to performance and orchestral careers thanks to the work he has championed. On leaving, Alok gives me a CD of Tarang, the UK’s Indian classical music ensemble to listen to when I get home.

12.04

My next destination is the regenerated Baltic Triangle area of Liverpool, where the Community Interest Company landlords are ensuring a thriving creative industries hub whose tenants benefit from lower rents and opportunities to collaborate which are fundamental to their success. As I walk past posters advertising the next Biennale and public art celebrating the city’s heritage, I’m reminded of the incredible journey Liverpool has been through, particularly in recent years. Not only of heartbreak and tragedy but also how the people of Liverpool embraced the importance of the arts and, in particular, music which gave them pride in themselves and their city. I am reminded of the commission that Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra undertook to commemorate the 96 victims of the Hillsborough Stadium disaster. Working with composer, Michael Nyman, Symphony No.11: Hillsborough Memorial includes the names of all those who died in 1989 and was performed in Liverpool Cathedral in 2014 as part of the Biennale.

12.43

My first meeting in the Baltic Creative Campus is with Liverpool Sound City, and Becky tells me about their plans to enhance the network of festivals in the North West and to tackle the lack of appropriate industry support for emerging and diverse talent who can develop into the status of festival headliners.

13.42

Over a quick lunch in Unit 21 (which reminds me of the similar spaces that popped up all over Hackney in the past 8 years) I listen to my playlist of artists we’ve been able to support through organisations such as Merseyside Arts Foundation. She Drew the Gun has been working hard since they were given support from Merseyside Arts Foundation for much needed studio time and mentoring. Since then, the ‘dreamy lyrical psych-pop band’ has gone on to win Glastonbury’s Emerging Talent Contest. Check out ‘If You Could See’. Another great Merseyside achievement has been The Lottery Winners, who were successful through our Emerging Artist Fund with PledgeMusic and who we showcased at The Great Escape. After my meeting with Peter Shilton, I listen to their debut EP with indie pop greats like Elizabeth and Young Love I can’t wait to hear their first album, now possible with the recent signing to major label Warner Bros.

15.23

Leaving the creative industries quarter, I switch my playlist and listen to the new release from Perhaps Contraption playing at the Manchester Jazz Festival at the end of July. As a group they are certainly pushing boundaries and creating a unique musical experience. Check out their second album, Mud Belief but also watch them live as they’re great performers too.

I’m meeting with Yaw next, Creative Director of ‘Nothin but the Music’ an academy for young talent in Liverpool to be empowered to have successful careers in the music industry. Yaw brought some of his recent graduates to a showcase in Camden where I met the incredibly talented Jalen Ngonda. After our meeting, I listen to Jalen’s ‘You Deserve What You Got’ on my final walk across the city to Hope Street and the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall.

19.23

My day ends with a wonderful concert celebrating 10 years of conductor Vaisly Petrenko’s tenure at Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. An evening of Elgar’s interpretation of the Italian Riviera ‘In the South (Alassio)’, Shostakovich’s very modern Cello Concerto No1 in E flat and ending on Rachmaninov’s Symphony No.3 in A minor which, although didn’t have many contemporary admirers, is a wonderful homage to Russia, its history and his devotion to his homeland.

22.14

On my wander back to the Albert Dock, I’m back in contemporary mode, and reflecting on my love of northern cities and their relationship to the people who live there. Liverpool particularly reminds me of home, of Newcastle, where I grew up and discovered punk, goth and was influenced by my mum’s love of Stan Getz and Motown. Musing on the thoughts of home, I listen to Samantha Whates ‘Granny’s House’ in which she explores what makes us think of home and, for her, in this song at least, it’s a cup of tea. We helped Sam when she was injured on tour and we were able to, literally, get her on her feet again. She generously support Help Musicians UK in our recent Musicians Against Depression #MAD campaign (musicanddepression.org.uk) and talked openly of her own experiences with mental health as a professional performer.

As I walk around the docks, it occurs to me that I should end my stay I Liverpool with another childhood influence, this time from my sister. We spent many happy hours listening and playing Beatles songs so my final choice of the day is the album, Revolver. With its ambitious diversification sparking new musical subgenres, its eclectic nature feels an appropriate place to conclude my own diverse musical journey of the North West.

If you enjoyed Claire’s example and would like to tell your own Harkive story in a similar way, you can do so by emailing [email protected] on or after 19th July with the tale of your listening day, writing as much or as little as you want. If email is not your thing, you can contribute your story in a number of other ways, such as by Tweeting with the hashtag #harkive across the day, by posting to the Harkive page on Facebook, or by adding stories and images to Tumbr and Instagram – just remember to add the hashtag #harkive to each of your posts. More information on the ways in which you can tell your story are on the How To Contribute page. Find out more at www.harkive.org 

Harkive 2016 is just 6 days away. We do hope you’ll join us on Tuesday 19th July by telling us the story of your listening day. If Harkive sounds interesting, please do help us spread the word by telling your friends about the project. In the meantime you can keep an eye on the project by following us on Twitter, or by liking our Facebook page. If you have any questions about the project please feel free to email us.

On Tuesday 19th July Harkive will return for its fourth year to once again collect stories online from people about the detail of their music listening experience.

The project asks people to tell the tale of How, Where and Why they listen to music on a single day each year, with the aim of capturing for posterity a snapshot of the way in which we interact with the sounds and technology of today. Since launching in 2013 the project has gathered over 8,000 stories, and on Tuesday 19th July we’ll be doing it all again. We hope you’ll join us by telling Harkive your story.

We’re now on the final countdown to Harkive 2016, with just 7 days to go. As we have done in previous years, in the run up to the big day we’ll be posting some ‘example’ stories from people who do interesting things with their music listening. Today we welcome Andy Inglis, owner of renowned Artist Management company, 5000.

Andy is an Artist Manager, Tour Manager, Mentor and Lecturer in the Live Music Industry. His career started in Scotland in 1990, DJing and running raves around the country. He began managing bands and small electronic labels, moving to London in 1997 to continue the work. In 2005 he co-founded The Luminaire which won London Venue of The Year and UK Venue of The Year in the first two years. He booked Quart - Norway's biggest and oldest music festival - and spent two years travelling the world with Savages as their Tour Manager. He now does the same for Mercury Prize-nominated artist William Doyle (East India Youth) on XL Recordings, whom he also manages, alongside rapper/producer Denzel Himself, improvisational pianist Tom Rogerson, composer John Uren and artist and sound designer Novo Amor. He is International Advisor for artist Jenny Hval and has co-founded up a mentoring initiative to help young women into the music industry. If he had his way he would ban guest lists, encores, cover versions, jazz-funk and Nestlé chocolate.

Andy kindly agreed to keep a record of his music listening on Thursday 5th July, and here is his story..

For someone whose life revolves around music, I don’t always have time for it. But it’s been my life for twenty-six years and it will continue to be until my life is over. A privilege I’m unable to articulate.

I love all the music I work with and return to it often. And I get a lot of demos. It doesn’t leave much time for new music, and since I stopped promoting shows (at a venue I used to co-own in London) in 2008, I no longer seek it out. Enough seems to find me and let’s face it, at forty-three I’m no longer the target market for the majority of the world’s musical output. As I look at the clock, it's gone 1535 and I’ve not played a note. It’s unlikely I will all day.

Tomorrow morning I’ll visit Liverpool to appear on a friend’s radio show. We’ll play music and talk about the music industry. He’s just sent me a list of fifteen artists he’ll play. I recognise seven, have an opinion on one. He asked me to play five tracks. I’m going with the work of Julia Holter, Grimes, Glen Campbell, Paula Temple, Pete & Rock and CL Smooth. Holter’s latest album is, without a word of hyperbole, a masterpiece. Grimes’ ‘Art Angels’ from last year is the best pop album I’ve heard in maybe a decade. Glen Campbell speaks to the romantic in me, Paula Temple is producing some of the most compelling, brutal, industrial techno right now and Pete Rock & CL Smooth’s ’T.R.O.Y’ is without question one of the greatest Hip-Hop tracks of all time.

In a couple of hours I’ll go for a run. I don’t play music when I’m running; the cables and player and earphones are physically encumbering. After dinner I’ll have a Skype call with a friend in Montreal, get to bed early for an 0500 start. After Liverpool it’s London, Cardiff, Mallorca, Las Vegas, and into the desert for a drive across America. That’s where music makes sense to me, where I’ll fall in love with it all all over again, not through laptop speakers, or in the clubs and bars we shoehorn musicians into and hope their art somehow makes sense over the clatter of glasses and voices raised, but breathing and soaring through open windows, beneath huge skies, into a burning desert sunset.

If you enjoyed Andy’s example and would like to tell your own Harkive story in a similar way, you can do so by emailing [email protected] on or after 19th July with the tale of your listening day, writing as much or as little as you want. If email is not your thing, you can contribute your story in a number of other ways, such as by Tweeting with the hashtag #harkive across the day, by posting to the Harkive page on Facebook, or by adding stories and images to Tumbr and Instagram – just remember to add the hashtag #harkive to each of your posts. More information on the ways in which you can tell your story are on the How To Contribute page. Visit www.harkive.org to find out more. 

Harkive 2016 is just 7 days away. We do hope you’ll join us on Tuesday 19th July by telling us the story of your listening day. If Harkive sounds interesting, please do help us spread the word by telling your friends about the project. In the meantime you can keep an eye on the project by following us on Twitter, or by liking our Facebook page. If you have any question about the project please feel free to email us.