Dispatches From... The Ambient Label Hub #009
For this week's blog post, the monthly Dispatches From The Ambient Label Hub radio show is back! As always, each hour-long episode features two presenters - the first sharing Ambient tracks based around a challenge set in the previous episode, and then the second presenting a range of sounds from the wider Ambient scene.
This month, I open the show with the theme that Adrian Newton of Evergreen Music set me last month - to share Ambient music themed around place. This is a really special topic for me, not least because I made a few albums about different places under my Glåsbird alias. I've always been fascinated in geography and different cultures, and since I got into Ambient music almost 20 years ago and started capturing field recordings, this interest has developed even further. I didn't find it too difficult to find records in my collection that are dedicated to a place, and hope you enjoy these selections.
As always, mid way through the show, a second presenter takes over to share a 'Dispatch' of recent Ambient releases to dive into. This month it was Andrew Heath's turn and he shares a collection of sounds from in and around the community.
You can listen to our latest show via the player below or HERE and you can find the tracklist below. If now isn't a good time to listen and you'd like to know a little more about the Ambient Label Hub and what to expect from these shows, see below under the tracklist. I'll keep this information in each month as a recap of what it's all about.
Intro Theme
01. Hans Joachim Roedelius - Schöne Welt (Intro)
Challenge
Ambient Music For Place
Presented by Harry Towell
02. Mhairi Hall & David de la Haye - Mallachie
03. Fen - The Swerve
04. Penguin Café - Adelie
05. Richard Skelton - Green Withins Brook
06. Patricia Wolf - Return To Iceland
07. John Also Bennett - Easter Daydream
08. Paul Horn - Ustad Isa / Mantra III
09. Jeremiah Chiu & Marta Sofia Honer - Kumlinge Kyrka
10. Richard Sage - Wells-next-the-Sea
Dispatch
Presented by Andrew Heath
11. Mosaicist - All That Remains
12. Tides - Pale Light
13. Tides - Emerging
14. Phonsonic - A Dream
15. Jens Pauly - Vast
16. Innesti - Then, Your Orbit
What is the Ambient Label Hub?
In 2025 Andrew Heath and I were invited to put on a small event at the Woodbridge Ambient Festival. We roped in Adrian and James along with artists on our labels including Adrian Lane and Slow Clinic, and before long we were trying to explain to the organisers who was who. Most of us ran record labels and most of us were performing in some capacity, so we settled on an idea that our event would aim to showcase what record labels can bring for artists and where we sit in the Ambient music scene. There were merch tables, performances, and we gave a talk on a range of topical discussion points centered around artistry and releasing music.
After the event, we enjoyed working together so much that we decided to explore ideas on how we could more closely tie our record labels together, for the benefit of the Ambient community. So, Elm and Evergreen were welcomed as fellow leaders of our Inner Echo community (see the bottom of the website to join us). We're continuing to support one another and the artists in our community; holding further events around the UK and hosting this monthly radio show. In case you missed it, below is a documentary we shared after the Woodbridge event, filmed and edited by James.
What was the idea behind the radio show?
James Osland runs a podcast series called Moor Thoughts and we've all been guests since it launched and he also has made weekly 'Sleepy Sunday' Ambient mixes for many years. Then Andrew and I have been working since last year on a music radio show I started a few years back, called Vervine. So we're no strangers to sharing music in this way, through shows we prepare and share. We chatted about the idea of launching a monthly show and discovered that Adrian had been doing a show for CAMP radio, 'Sound Mosaics For A Broken World'. Since he already knew CAMP, we decided it made sense to reach out to see if we could secure a monthly slot - and here we are!
Why did we launch this radio show?
Given our community focus, we didn't want this to essentially be a label promo outlet, to showcase the music on our labels. We wanted to champion the Ambient music scene, and support the community with a space to share the work of talented artists. So we'll actively be looking for members of Inner Echo and the wider scene, to send us music to consider for our playlists. The shows will go out on CAMP's Mixcloud to reach their audience, and then I will share these as blog posts so that the Whitelabrecs audience and wider community will hopefully look forward to checking them out. There are some mammoth, extremely talented artists in the Ambient scene who'll need little introduction - not to mention the founders and heroes of the genre down the years. We wanted this show to aid discovery too - hopefully connecting those who listen with some new artists that they may not know about.
What can listeners expect?
Each show will include a 30 minute feature of our selections, chosen by the presenter for that given month. But if discovering new music alone wasn't enough, we wanted to try and come up with something exciting to hopefully keep people coming back... So we came up with the idea of a monthly Ambient challenge! We have a list of topics and the presenter in the previous show will select a new challenge for the next. The list has some fascinating themes - such as geographic regions or particular instrument groups. For the presenter, this may prove quite tricky, to hunt down particular niches of Ambient music and so once again, we'll likely be leaning on the Ambient music community for some pointers.
I'll keep you updated on all future broadcasts here on the Whitelabrecs blog, but you can also listen live, and to the wider schedule, on CAMP HERE. We hope you enjoy our show! To learn more about the labels and the Ambient Label Hub, click HERE
