Parklife

I was grumpy. Once again, the lack of decent sleep the previous night and the continuing popularity of Game Of Thrones was too much for my sunny disposition to bear. Fortunately, the day was rescued by a strip of sandpaper eroding the corrosion on the battery connectors in my field recorder, which jumped back to life with its tiny Game Boy green screen and total inability to deal with the wind, and we made for the park.

East Park is a park in east Hull. Not only home to that thrilling factoid, it also houses a lake, lots of pretty trees, evil geese, the Khyber Pass, and an exotic bird enclosure. It is the latter for which I set foot outside in the sunny June weather, lathered in suncream and glistening like some pale Turkish wrestler. I want to record them.

Diatryma And The Terror Birds is an instrumental track about gigantic prehistoric feathered predators. A shoe-in for the Top 40, obviously. I'm a big fan of found sounds in music creating an environment for the guitars, drums and such to happily inhabit in their riffing, and exotic birds chirruping away in their thankfully happy brainless song could evoke the vibe of a landscape stalked by dinosaurs, tiny mammals, and Bruce Forsyth. It's the closest I can get, anyway, and it's a day out to clear the misery fog out of my head, so there.

The thing folks don't seem to realise about microphones is that they record sound universally. So no matter if someone is sitting on a bench with a fuzzy silver box listening to a rather active parrot, you can wander right up to the cage and start saying aloud profound thoughts like "Ug" and, especially if you're with a tiny child, hold them up in front of the cage constantly barking out "LOOK AT THE BIRD" while the wee pink thing in a sunhat stares fascinated at a fencepost. So far, recordings so good. The park's enclosure has a number of beautiful creatures to amuse and crap on the public. The aforementioned parrot, a surefire crowd pleaser for those who think chanting "Who's a pretty boy?" hasn't been done enough in the last century, I am told later has learnt a number of profanities to repeat back to families once it's had enough of the attention. Only in Hull. The canaries, budgies, and various finches have a walkthrough built into their enclosure, so you can walk through a tiny forest as tiny brightly coloured wings flutter all around. There are also other exotic imports like emus (probably the closest thing the present day has to a terror bird), cockatiels, Australian things with bizarre plumage and names like boing-boing, chickens, and peacocks. OK, so some are more imported than others. The raccoon dog strictly isn't a bird, but there's one there anyway. The chickens and the peacocks give some great vocal performances, thankfully right in front of my mic and far enough away from small children trying to physically abuse the parrot (it seems 'sunny day in June' is a valid excuse for parents keeping them out of school these days). A park ranger approached to enquire about my activities. Apparently, people had reported to her "a strange man with a device".

"Strange, yes," I have to concede. You win this round, concerned public. We have a nice chat about recording the birds and I get some tips on the best times to pop by. The canaries go mad around closing time, and the emu shrieks if you talk to it. The parrot also mimics babies crying when it simply cannot. I reflect on the fact that a blobby ginger man with a microphone is more cause for concern to passers by than a small boy climbing up the cages and shouting at the inhabitants, but I guess people have different standards. The cock crows into the wind and it's time to go.

Meanwhile, in cyberspace, Moray has assembled a collection of keyboard tracks, terracotta plant pot percussion, and his own birdsong, all of which thrill and delight me out of any remaining stupor. It's good to know that there's someone else who is as bonkers with their music as I am. This is why we're working together. Diatryma is going to be included as part of North Haverbrook's debut EP called Where In The World, which will be out when it's finished. That'll be as soon as I can sing my own lyrics without wanting to punch myself in the throat. This year, definitely. Hopefully.