Ben Norland

If John's key skill was the guitar, and Gerard's keyboards and singing, then mine was switching on the tape recorder.

I believe that I invented Spanner music - though I was not the very best at the genre.

My current activities outside of CA are mainly recording and releasing music as themilgramobediencetoauthorityexperiment. You can find a lot of material for download at Bandcamp and also on all the usual platforms.

^{trail of droplets photo by martin holtkamp}

The above is a little too self-effacing re CA, I feel I must interject (Ben is unable in this regard). Whilst I was in a position, through the generosity of relatives, to bring some very basic instruments to CA in our earliest days, it was Ben who found himself in a position to provide the fundamental elements of CA’s 1980s music, both in terms of instruments and recording apparatus (and John of course, with his guitars, amplifiers and recording machines). Ben was always the band engineer and essentially producer (though those roles have now divided to some degree between him and John), and our studio/HQ was Ben’s house, Vine Cottage, and it was Ben who handled our correspondence. He was responsible for the basic choice of tracks and the sequencing of all our 1980s albums, and compiled both The Uncle Of The Boot and Sinclair’s Luck alone, and did the artwork on two of our three cassette albums – and everything since. In the ’80s I turned up to record, perhaps with some words, perhaps to write some lyrics with Ben beforehand, and I corresponded with Geoff, as did Ben. It is a matter of perplexity to me now that in my adolescent chaos I kept a record of the date of most of our recordings, yet was indifferent to so much else. GG, 05/10/26