Since its first release in 1982, Touch has created sonic and visual productions that combine innovation with a level of care and attention that has made it the most enduring of any independent music company of its time.
The first period up to the digitisation of music in the mid-80’s saw
the release of several cassette magazines, where sounds by luminaries such
as New Order, Cabaret Voltaire and The Residents were paralleled by visual
work and writing by Neville Brody, Jon Savage, Joseph Beuys and many others.
As the industry went through its usual elaborate cycles of self-annihilation
and rebirth, Touch adapted to incorporate new technologies with the old, underscoring
the power and necessity of editing and presentation to bring the best out of
each production.
Now working extensively with Fennesz, Chris Watson, Philip Jeck, Biosphere,
Ryoji Ikeda, BJNilsen and many others, Touch celebrated its 20th year in
2001 with a UK CMN-backed tour, including sell-out dates in Brighton, Bristol,
Glasgow, Newcastle, Salisbury and the QEH in London. The transitions from
analogue to digital, from camera-ready artwork to broadband file-sharing
and from 1/4” masters to website downloads are only the surface manifestations
of the great changes that have taken place in recorded music over the last
20 years. Touch has been at the forefront of these changes, and will continue
to be.
A short history: 1982 - 2007+
December 1982
First Touch release, Feature Mist, one in a series of six cassette magazines.
Exclusive tracks by New Order, Shostakovich, Simple Minds, Tuxedomoon, Soliman
Gamil, with images, graphics and stories from Psychic TV, Neville Brody,
Mayakovsky, Robert Wyatt and The Residents' Rozztox Manifesto... The cassettes
are sponsored
by Maxell but the mastering quality is pre-Roman.
1983-1986
Meridians One and Two, Touch Travel, Ritual: Lands End and Ritual: Magnetic
North, featuring artists such as Test Department, A Certain Ratio, Derek
Jarman, Russell
Mills, Peter Saville, General Strike, Jah Wobble, Gilbert and George, Joseph
Beuys, Jamie Reid, Greil Marcus, Jon Savage, The Residents and Cabaret Voltaire...
Slow improvements in the quality of cassette production/reproduction - a
medium designed entirely for domestic purposes rather than mass distribution.
1984 sees
Touch's first LP release, The Egyptian Music by Soliman Gamil, the composer
for the National State Theatre in Cairo who trained his own troupe to perform
and
record traditional Egyptian music annotated from documents found in the Pyramids.
The Revox tapes quickly deteriorated; they were treated at the Exchange prior
to release on CD in 1987, later the original cassettes were remastered for
A Map of Egypt Before the Sands.
1986-1987
'Interaction' exhibition at the Camden Arts Centre, London, featuring Peter
Blake, Brian Eno, Russell Mills, Jamie Reid and Touch. Feature on Channel
4's 'The Tube'.
Screening of Alternation Perception and Resistance by The Hafler Trio on
C4's 'After Image'. 1986 Also sees the first Touch record by The Hafler Trio
- The
Sea Org. This is followed by Brain Song (1986), Protection (1987), A Thirsty
Fish (1988), before
Ignotum per Ignotius becomes the first fully-fledged CD release, in non-jewel
case format (1989), followed by Masturbatorium (1991), FUCK (1992), Mastery
of Money (1992), Resurrection, with The Sons of God, (1993) and How to Reform
Mankind
(1994). The 1980s vinyl releases eventually came out on 6 CDs in a collaboration
with
The
Grey
Area of Mute Records, The Golden Hammer (1994). Currently being re-issued
by Korm Plastics, The Netherlands.
1988-1992
Artworking out of the Neville Brody Studio whilst working on various parallel
projects.
Production and release of the Z'EV retrospective, One Foot in the Grave.
1989
Production of Spiral series with A.M. McKenzie.
Vögel by Strafe Für Rebellion gathers together the Düsseldorf
group's finest recordings.
1990
Étant Donnés' Aurore, and Contact by John Duncan and A.M. McKenzie.
Digital bromides are output for the typographic artwork, thanks to QuarkXPress,
rather than marked up and sent to the typesetter. The beginning of the digital
typeface explosion and desktop publishing.
1991-1992
Production and publication of Vagabond, edited with Jon Savage. The independent
book distributor goes bankrupt. Rough Trade distribution having ceased to
be, also.
1993
Sandoz's (aka Richard H. Kirk) Digital Lifeforms CD is described in The Observer
as 'dance music for the twenty first century'. In the next 7 years, Kirk
records and releases 7 further CDs, Intensely Radioactive (1994), Every Man
Got Dreaming
(1995), Step, Write, Run (1996), Dark Continent (1996), Chant to Jah (1998),
Darkness at Noon (1999) and LoopStatic (2000).
1995
Touch releases Loopholes, the first solo cd by Philip Jeck, winner of the
Time Out Performance Award in 1993 for Vinyl Requiem. The first time digitally-generated
film becomes acceptable in the production process, so the beginning of our
association
with Orange and their hi-res scanning facility. 1995 also saw the release
of the first Touch Sampler CD.
1996
Touch releases the first solo CD by Chris Watson, formerly sound recordist
with the Royal Society for Protection of Birds, and later sound recordist
for many
BBC wildlife programmes, including David Attenborough's award-winning Life
of Birds. Closely followed by the highly acclaimed +/- by Ryoji Ikeda, the
minimalist Japanese composer who also composes and arranges the sound for
the performing
troupe Dumb Type. The Wire described it as "an absolutely indispensible
bridge between sinetone minimalism and Panasonic-style modernist techno".
It is difficult to describe. Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson's elegiac soundtrack
to the film "Children of Nature" acts as the perfect counterpoint.
1997
Release of the first solo CD by Mika Vainio from Pan Sonic (formerly Panasonic),
and beginning of collaboration with Mark Van Hoen (Locust) and Scala which
results in Last Flowers from the Darkness, a collection of works by Mark
Van Hoen covering
the period 1992-1996, and Scala's Beauty Nowhere and Compass Heart. The first
Rehberg & Bauer CD based on digital processing errors comes out. The same
year sees New Order's Video 5-8-6 recording finally emerge as a CD single and
enter the charts in the UK, no thanks to the major retailers' absurd policies.
1998
Heading into glitch territory _ the arrival of Apple's Powerbook computers
encourage musicians to develop their own mobile/performing studios. Philip
Jeck's Surf
takes the art of vinyl/turntable manipulation a step further. Chris Watson's
Outside the Circle of Fire uses close-up sound recordings of animal activity
to cast additional light on their relationships to digital sound.
1999
Touch & Fuse book, Fennesz's 47 degrees... CD and the the first release
by Oren Ambarchi.
2000
Touch releases Biosphere's Cirque on CD and LP. Chris Watson wins a distinction
at Prix Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria) for his CD Outside the Circle of
Fire (1998). Mika Vainio's Kajo is released. Ryoji Ikeda tours with Zoviet
France.
2001
Touch celebrates its 20th year with a UK tour with Biosphere, Fennesz & Hazard,
including May 21st at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London. Release of 'Touch Works...'
by Phill Niblock. The 3rd in the Rehberg & Bauer trilogy and Locust's double
CD, Wrong, are released. Matrix by Ryoji Ikeda wins the Golden Nica at Ars
Electronica festival. The first in a series of live releases, TO:CDR..., begins
with Philip Jeck's Live in Japan.
2002
Touch: Ringtones CD is released in February. Jóhann Jóhannsson's
Englabörn, 3rd albums by Biosphere, Philip Jeck and Mika Vainio. The live
tour continues around Europe, including the opening of the STUK centre in Leuven.
Easter Friday at the Pompidou Centre,
Paris, and the New Forms Festival in Den Haag. In October Touch toured Switzerland,
visiting Zurich, Fribourg and Geneva, and in November played a central part
in the Fricties Festival, Vooruit in Gent, Belgium.
2003
Mika Vainio's and Chris Watson's 3rd solo albums are released, along with
new cds by Phill Niblock and Ken Ikeda, and a first
acoustic cd from Ryoji Ikeda, op. Watson's Weather Report
at the Lovebytes festival, Cut and Splice and elsewhere. Double CD compilation
Spire, Organ Music, Past, Present & Future comes out for Christmas.
2004
A collaboration between Organum and Z'EV, Tinnitus, Philip Jeck's 7 and Venice
by Fennesz are released. First CD by Rosy Parlane, Iris. Spire performed
Live in Geneva Cathedral at La Batie festival, with Marcus Davidson, Fennesz,
Philip
Jeck,
Charles Matthews and BJNilsen. Jóhann Jóhannsson releases his
2nd album, Virthulegu forestar, on CD and DVD-A.
2005
BJ Nilsen releases Fade to white, and Spire Live from Geneva [see above]
is produced. First release on Touch for Jacob Kirkegaard, and in June a live
collaboration
between Christian Fennesz and Ryuichi Sakamoto. In October Touch plays Ultima,
Oslo, and then Spire Live in Göteborg, Sweden.
2006
The year begins with a major new release by Biosphere, and the start of the
25th anniversary events. A dedicated show was held in October in London,
and a festival in York immediately after. Rosy Parlane came over from New
Zealand, and other Touch artists who took part were Biosphere, Fennesz, Ryoji
Ikeda, Philip Jeck, Jacob Kirkegaard, BJNilsen and others. The tour coincided
with new albums by Rosy Parlane and Chris Watson ¬ BJNilsen, and field
Recordings from Geir Jenssen [Biosphere].
2007
Touch 25 finished witha sell-out event at The Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol with
a live performance of Storm, Biosphere and a workshop by Chris Watson & Mike
Harding. The year began with albums by KK Null, Lasse Marhaug | Nils Henrik
Asheim, Oren Ambarchi and BJNilsen as well as the full length studio album
by Fennesz Sakamoto. The Touch Sevens series of 7" vinyl began with Chris Watson's
recordings
of
the
Pacific
Ocean, heralding a foray into vinyl, which will be contnued into 2008. Most
of the Touch back catalogue also appeared as digital downloads...
A full catalogue of releases each year may be found here