Background fascination

The tube has always played a significant part in my life, as it has in millions of people's lives, and continues to fascinate and inspire me. I remember the wonder as a child travelling on the white, silver and sometimes red metal tubes from the open air at the end of the central line, plunging into the darkness at Stratford, listening to the sensory changes in sound, smell and light. The tube universe seemed so large with the maps, the branding, the tunnels and the darkness. 

I wondered what those big thick cables that seemed to follow you throughout the network were for and where they went. I was drawn into the liminal space where you were taken deeper and deeper into the darkness of the tunnels, feeling present in the moment as the lights, the smells, the sounds and the mystic wind hurtled itself towards you, as the clanging, screeching tube of light exited the darkness to the sometimes bustling and sometimes ghostly platforms. Platforms with strange while chocolate machines selling Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut and Hazelnut bars (can you still get those?), 20p and the turn of a handle dropping the bar into a small drawer, whose opening would reveal the chocolatey delight. A wrapper which could be dropped in a platform side bin.  

From this early age to the daily commute, late night socialising, and generally living and functioning in London, the tube was the backbone infrastructure which created a sense of belonging, a sense of place, a sense of excitement, a sense of danger and a sense of reliability. The tube connecting us, our interweaving lives, the conversations, the arguments, the laughs, the knowing nods. A millions lives converging, each one of us in our own mental place, each one of us with a purpose, a place to go, a errand to run, a train to catch, a love to meet, and multitude of live experiences to be explored. We cross paths, we encounter a million lives, whilst all the time being locked in our own thought world, intersecting with the lives of others.

For many years, day in and day out, a silent observer of the arterial backbone of London, people watching, infrastructure watching, listening and absorbing the subterranean world, feeling like a point fixed in time as the world existentially exists around me. I sit and I stand,  observing interchange and interaction, and stare out a different window, trying to see beyond the reflected glare from the fluorescence carriage lights. Leaving the memories, stresses and thoughts of the day at the ticket gate, the commute is a time to be mindful in the underground world, a time to just sit and wonder about the people, places, infrastructure and the secrets that exist within the brightly lit tube, being propelled by invisible electrons through the dark, liminal spaces below London, side to side with the layers of history and the ephemerality of those lives that came before.

The darkness inspired me. What was hiding down here, what was lurking in the cylindrical voids which disappeared off from the illuminated platforms into the unknown? What was carried on those mystery winds? And above all, what was happening to that decaying sound, rapidly attenuating and changing timbral qualities as it reverberated into the distance.

Ghost stations - South Kentish Town

I first became curious about ‘ghost’ stations in the late 1990’s, when my daily commute on the Northern Line used to go through a strange space with a break in the tunnel. The space seemed to briefly open up and then return to tunnel wall almost as quickly. It was what I later found out to be the abandoned South Kentish Town tube station. Crammed on to the tube as it weaved it’s weary way through the complex junction at Camden town on to the Highgate branch, as the train left Camden and picked up, sometimes when I was pressed up against the window I could see what seemed to be a break in the tunnel and a couple of lights. 

Of course most times the tube was travelling too fast to get a proper glance, there was an awkward reflection on the window, or it was too awkward to try and turn around without getting angry glares from my fellow passengers. This puzzle always intrigued me, I always wondered what on earth it was that I was seeing, this curiosity peaked on the odd occasion when the train stopped at a signal in the tunnel. I am sure that I saw a removed platform or walkway and a doorway. I was young with a busy social life, so I usually went about my business and often forgot about it. In addition of course this was at a time in the early days for the internet, pre Google, pre everything you might want to know being available at the click of a search button. It was really hard to find out what I was seeing was without some form of massive effort!. 

The next clue in this ghost station hunt was above ground in the form of a remarkable building at the fork in the road between Kentish Town Road and Royal College Street. When I used to walk past I always thought there was something unique and interesting about the building, but being slightly young and naive, I didn’t put two and two together for sometime. Of course, I know now that it is a similar design to many of the Leslie Green tiled stations on the Underground network (including Kentish Town and Camden Station). Yes reader, perhaps I could have done a bit of digging but I was getting on enjoying a hectic London social life. 

As an avid psychogeographic flâneur, the streets of Camden, Highgate, Hampstead and the West End formed the basis of my wanderings. Often, as throughout much of my life, I would put my walkman (and laterally iPod) headphones in and set off and wander the streets, parks and spaces of the great city. The mystery building always intrigued me though, plus for a stunning stand out building its usage at the time was somewhat strange, it was then a Cash Converters with a ‘Sauna Club’ through the door at the side. 

For all my years of wandering, it was a long time before I connected the dots and thought that the building and the strange platform must be connected.  It was around that time that I felt confident enough to start mentioning my thoughts to a few people and this resulted in me being  very fortunate to get a book for Christmas on London’s Disused Underground stations. 

And would you believe it, amongst the pages was a section on South Kentish town. It was a station!!! I wasn't going mad!!! Yes the platforms have been removed and it was abandoned and there was no access. From that point onwards I was inspired to find out as much as possible about these disused and abandoned ghost stations lurking around the London Underground Network. At this point in time there were no tours available, and it was not possible to gain access (and that level of urban exploration was well beyond me and I'm sure would have gotten me into a lot of trouble). I always hoped one day that I might be able to visit at least one of these, if not all of these spaces.   

Hidden London

Thankfully, Hidden London discovered it seems that I was not the only one interested in these sites and seized the opportunity to develop a whole series of tours at many of the sites throughout the network. There is also now the fantastic Secrets of the London Underground TV programme, but it is no substitute for the sensorial experience of being down in the darkness and reverberance of the tunnels. 

Now there are many things I have to be fortunate about in life and the biggest of which is my amazing wife and daughter, who brought me two of these trips as a birthday present, which I was over the moon with. The first tour I was booked on was Down Street - Churchill’s Secret Station and I couldn’t wait! I arrived early for the tour, really excited, and I didn't want to miss out on a single second of this experience. As I was quite early at the meeting point on Piccadilly, I proceeded to spend some of the extra time wandering around the local area taking photos, above ground.

Coincidentally, the day that I had I picked at random (or so I thought!) from the offered dates to go on the tour, seemingly happened to be the same day there was a massive party happening for a certain resident of Buckingham Palace. Yes, I had picked the 2nd of June, totally unbeknownst to me, Jubilee Day! London was crammed and heaving especially on Piccadilly as there was talk of the Queen doing a drive past. So the flaneur in me moved away from the crowd, happily wandering down the seemingly deserted side streets of Mayfair. I was able to take a few pictures in and around the Down Street area, including the nondescript door which was the entrance to the station. 

Now in respect of the tour and staff who didn't really want people recording, taking professional pictures or videoing the whole experience, I will refrain from detailing my whole experience and some of the amazing things that are to be experienced on the tour. Obviously they want other people to go on the tour and I for one would fully recommend doing it if you can, I found it to be an absolutely amazing experience and  I didn't want it to end. There was so much to explore! 

Soundscapes

Now to the important bit! The sound! The experiential quality of the acoustics and sound environment was immersive and engaging, as you would expect and of course it was something I really wanted to capture. Given the circumstances of it being a tour, with other people and the tour guide being present, it was quite hard to capture the soundscape in silence, although I was still able to make a few recordings. Also, given that I didn’t really know what to expect, I didn't have a big or ideal setup with me. I did plan on making a binaural recording, using Soundman OKM Classics but there were two reasons that I didn’t choose this method, the first being I think the tour guides and other people on the trip would have probably thought it really strange that I had paid to come on a tour only to be walking around with headphones in not listening to the tour, and secondly I thought explaining what I was doing would have been a bit strange to everyone present. 

I chose simply to go with my ever present Olympus LS-P4 which I was able to position in a few suitable places as well as use handheld on occasion. If anyone from London Underground or Hidden London is reading this article, I would love to get back down there and make proper recordings along with some impulse response recordings for heritage purposes, and a way of capturing the sounds and acoustic fingerprints of these places for future generations. The spaces, the lift shafts, the tunnels, the corridors, the nooks and crannies were simply fantastic acoustic spaces, and I can imagine they would provide some great inspirational impulse responses which could be used for my (and others) compositions and sound art. 

Note : I will try and get in contact with Hidden London and try to get back down to record some soundscapes and impulses. 

I also managed to take some pictures, and I what I hope you can see from them, was that it was like going back to a space frozen in time, voices of those who worked (and lived) down there trapped in the walls, drawing you in to an experience of intersection with the voices of the past. I was left a hauntological stasis with regards to the whole experience, and this is assume is why so many people are interested in this whole hidden, secret, urban decay exploration phenomenon as a method to feel in tune with the ghosts of our previous or early lives, returning to a time when our internal world seemed like a world of potential and future thinking, a world of awe. Perhaps even an idealised better place than the reality of the simulacra virtual world of hyper constructed reality that we are now all locked into, with a future that isn’t developing into anything more than digital entrapment. 

I would wholly recommend booking on one or more of these tours, they give an insight into the past, as well as a feeling of existing in a reality bubble of physical experience. I've learnt about the recording practicalities from this tour and what to expect next time, when I'll be able to make a few better recordings.

Sounds - Not the best recordings (Stereo)