Intimate Journals

Paul met Carlos in May 1987, during a sound recording course in Brixton's Bon Marche Building, and introduced him to the marvels of the 16-track recording desk, the Atari personal computer, the Dr T music software, the Ensonic Mirage, the Yamaha DX-7, MIDI etc. Together, they worked on the production of two of Carlos's pieces: “The Coming Hero” and “The Death of Madame Amedée”. The latter, a 7/4 toccata, now lost, played continuously in Telmo Lanes and Rogério Nazari's room in the XIX Bienal Internacional de São Paulo, where it was reportedly heard by Brian Eno.Paul and Carlos got together again in the early 90s, when Paul was working as a sound engineer in the heart of London's Soho and Carlos writing his PhD on musique concrète in Old Durham Town. As P von C and Dr P, Paul put words to Carlos's music and Carlos put music to Paul's words. Resorting to such gear as a Minimoog, a Prophet V, a Juno-60, a Proteus II module, and Roland S-550 and Akai S1000 samplers, they created the main body of Intimates Journals' works, roughly in the following order: “Flight of Fancy”, “Have Your Dream”, “Spiral” (Paul Hart, violin), “When Shadows Fall” (Dr P, piano), “Delirious Thing”, “Jigsaw”, “Elephants from Flies” and “Time to Go”, all sung by P von C.In the mid-90s, while Dr P pursued his academic career in Brazil, P von C got together with Philip Jewson. Transmuting materials created by the Intimate Journals, they conceived “Excuse”, “Spiral II”, “Precious”, “Elephants II” and “The Everyday Things Disappear”.To those who heard them when they were produced, the Intimate Journals sounded invariably quaint. We believe that in the days of vintage gear, multiculturalism and fragmented niches, they are doomed to sound more and more common until eventually fading into oblivion, as all pop should.