THE CARETAKER IS RELEASING SIX NEW WORKS.
'Everywhere at the end of time' is a new and finite series exploring dementia, its advance and its totality. Featuring the sounds from the journey The Caretaker will make after being diagnosed as having early onset dementia. Each stage will reveal new points of progression, loss and disintegration. Progressively falling further and further towards the abyss of complete memory loss and nothingness. Viewing dementia as a series of stages can be a useful way to understand the illness, but it is important to realise that this only provides a rough guide to the progress of the condition. Drawing on a recorded history of 20 years of recollected memories this is one final journey and study into recreating the progression of dementia through sound.

Seeping to the surface two years since his cherished and widely acclaimed 'Persistent Repetition Of Phrases' LP, 'An Empty Bliss Beyond The World' returns our doddering protagonist to the deserted ballroom, wandering its waxed floor and dilapidated grandeur in an attempt to capture an era which has long since disappeared but still haunts the atmosphere. In the meantime he's accessed an alternate set of memory banks with his derivés into Leyland Kirby land, but back in The Caretaker role, James Leyland Kirby conjures a quieter, more introspective spirit, lost in his own mind amidst a low-lit labyrinth of ever-decaying and antediluvian shellac phrases. Sourced from his mysterious collection of 78s, these vague snippets of archaic sonics reflect the ability of Alzheimers patients to recall the songs of their past, and with them recollections of places, people, moods and sensations. The effect is subtly amplified by the chronic vinyl cut at Berlin's D&M, allowing each memory to segue seamlessly and unpredictably into the next for an otherworldly and disorienting experience. Coupled with another deeply enigmatic artwork commission from Ivan Seal, 'An Empty Bliss Beyond The World', is a highly potent transmission from one of the most singular characters operating in music today.

EVERYWHERE AT THE END OF TIME (COMPLETE EDITION)
When work began on this series it was difficult to predict how the music would unravel itself. Dementia is an emotive subject for many and always a subject I have treated with maximum respect.
Stages have all been artistic reflections of specific symptoms which can be common with the progression and advancement of the
different forms of Alzheimer's.
Thanks always for your support of this series of works
remembered by The Caretaker.
Physical editions of all stages on both vinyl and compact-disc
are available now and are being distributed by Boomkat.
boomkat.com/labels/history-always-favours-the-winners
May the ballroom remain eternal.
C'est fini.
--
STAGE 1 - (A+B)
Here we experience the first signs of memory loss.
This stage is most like a beautiful daydream.
The glory of old age and recollection.
The last of the great days.
STAGE 2 - (C+D)
The second stage is the self realisation and awareness that something is wrong with a refusal to accept that. More effort is made to remember so memories can be more long form with a little more deterioration in quality. The overall personal mood is generally lower than the first stage and at a point before confusion starts setting in.
STAGE 3 - (E+F)
Here we are presented with some of the last coherent memories before confusion fully rolls in and the grey mists form and fade away. Finest moments have been remembered, the musical flow in places is more confused and tangled. As we progress some singular memories become more disturbed, isolated, broken and distant. These are the last embers of awareness before we enter the post awareness stages.
STAGE 4 - (G+H+I+J)
Post-Awareness Stage 4 is where serenity and the ability to recall singular memories gives way to confusions and horror. It's the beginning of an eventual process where all memories begin to become more fluid through entanglements, repetition and rupture.
STAGE 5 - (K+L+M+N)
Post-Awareness Stage 5 confusions and horror.
More extreme entanglements, repetition and rupture can give way to
calmer moments. The unfamiliar may sound and feel familiar.
Time is often spent only in the moment leading to isolation.
STAGE 6 - (O+P+Q+R)
Post-Awareness Stage 6 Is without description.
--
All stages featuring cover art imagined and painted by Ivan Seal.
All stages mastered by Lupo at Calyx in Berlin.
All stages were released on Vinyl and Compact Disc via
'History Always Favours The Winners'.
Distribution of Vinyl and CD's by Boomkat.

James Kirby's work as The Caretaker has always dealt with the suggestion of haunted memory and the obscuring of temporal motion, and this latest album makes that more explicit than ever, with titles that reference amnesia, Alzheimer's, past life regression and other such memory misfires and short circuits. Musically, this album might be compared to Philip Jeck's manipulated vinyl tracts, featuring similarly oceanic swells of crackle and dust, with faded pianos or big band sounds wafting wraith-like across the mix. After conjuring the sinister atmospherics of The Shining with his debut album Selected Memories From The Haunted Ballroom, The Caretaker has been chasing this idea of sound leaving its indelible mark on a space and time, so consequently these creepy, semi-dissolved musical passages sound no more tangible than shadows, and the album for the most part comes across as some sort of séance held via wax cylinder. Arguably the most accomplished and rewarding Caretaker album to date, Persistent Repetition Of Phrases is an album you'll want to snap up fast - there's only 500 of these in circulation...