I can’t recall where I first intersected with Alex Tomlinson’s work, but I’m utterly enchanted with Hear to There, a website of his that uses community-sourced sound bites to plot paths around the globe in sound. The recordings are generally ambient, rather than the narrated Rambles I record with vague regularity, but they evoke such a sense of place it still feels like you’re in dialogue with a character.
There are so many exquisite tiny projects like this that enjoy fireworks of activity when they launch and then end up drifting through the web in quieter ways. (I’m thinking of Meatspace, among others.) Part of me feels sad that the hype machine burns out so quickly, other parts are happy that these small-scale experiments go to ground—just waiting for the next unwary traveler to stumble into their midst.
(I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that Alex is also a designer of bird-themed items. His illustration stuff is absolutely gorgeous, and I was lucky enough to receive one of his Vexillowlogy patches in the mail this year. He’s got a shop, if you’re a bird nerd like me and flush with Christmas cash.)
