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Various Artists — the places we carry
the places we carry — 1:51:40
Mixed and edited by Ian Hawgood
As we begin to gather the threads of 2026 at Home Normal, it felt like the right moment to bring together some of the music that has travelled with us through the year.
‘the places we carry’ brings together 24 released and forthcoming works from Home Normal in 2026, unfolding across almost two hours of music. Mixed and edited by Home Normal curator Ian Hawgood, the pieces have been arranged as a continuous sequence rather than presented as a conventional collection of separate tracks. Recordings overlap, recede and gently transform one another, with edits and transitions allowing the music to move as a single unfolding whole. Familiar works appear alongside new versions and unreleased material, forming a reflection on the year and on the spaces that open between sounds.
The accompanying photograph was taken by our dear friend Stijn Hüwels, whose friendship, music and shared love of Japan have been deeply inspirational to Home Normal over the years. Although the image was not made in Tokyo, its balcony, quiet architecture and expansive blue sky immediately brought back those early years of living in Japan, when the ideas that would eventually become Home Normal were quietly beginning to form.
Much of that period was spent listening to music from an urban balcony and simply watching the world move by. Those clear Tokyo skies, and the stillness that could be found within such a vast city, became part of the atmosphere from which Home Normal emerged.
The name itself grew from thinking about what ‘home’ might mean while living somewhere far from where I had come from. His Name Is Alive’s “Home Is in Your Head” was an important touchstone in my youth, carrying with it the idea that home need not be fixed to one geographical place, but could be something we carry with us. ‘Normal’ came from a related feeling — that moving between places, cultures and different versions of home could become something natural rather than exceptional; simply another way of being in the world.
Nearly eighteen years later, Stijn’s photograph seems to hold that idea beautifully. It is not Tokyo, and yet something within it immediately feels like the home I remember there. One place quietly contains another. Architecture, light, memory and distance begin to overlap, until the distinction between where we were and where we are becomes less important than what remains with us.
‘the places we carry’ grew from that feeling. Places change, homes change, and our relationship to them changes with time, but they do not simply disappear when we leave them. They continue through memory, friendship, music and the small details that unexpectedly return us to somewhere else. In many ways, Home Normal has always existed in that space: between places rather than belonging entirely to any one of them.
The artists we have worked with throughout this year have been extraordinarily inspiring. Their generosity, encouragement and continued belief in the label have made it a genuine pleasure to work together so regularly, and have reminded me of why Home Normal began in the first place. Every release has grown from conversation, friendship and a shared care for music, rather than simply from the act of publishing an object. To continue exchanging ideas and bringing this work into the world alongside such thoughtful people has been one of the great privileges of the label.
Home Normal is not ending, and physical releases will continue next year. After several years of maintaining a full and steady rhythm, however, the label will gradually begin to move more slowly. Life increasingly asks for time and attention elsewhere, and it is becoming harder to sustain the pace that has shaped the past few years.
This is not a conclusion, but a change of rhythm.
Physical objects have always been deeply important to Home Normal, but so too have listening, friendship, collaboration and the slow accumulation of shared work. There will still be new music, physical editions and future projects when the time feels right, simply at a gentler pace.
The sequence includes music from Wil Bolton, David Cordero, anthéne, Far away Nebraska, zakè, Federica Deiana, Tomosla, Tomotsugu Nakamura, Michael Scott Dawson, Rhucle, Aiko Takahashi, landtitles, maps and diagrams, midorinozu, Jason van Wyk, James Murray, Daniël Jolan, and Ian Hawgood.
Near the end of the mix, James Murray’s ‘Borrowed by Bees (Returned Mix)’, from the forthcoming “Careful Now (Unmasked)”, appears in a newly reworked form ahead of its release in October — something familiar returning altered, while still carrying traces of its earlier life. The year itself will eventually close with Ian Hawgood and Jason van Wyk’s “Surroundings” — a title that returns us, perhaps fittingly, to where Home Normal began: with the idea that place is never entirely fixed, but made from what gathers around us and what we continue to carry with us when we move on.
From there, the sampler closes with anthéne’s ‘time and space’. Time and space have, after all, shaped Home Normal from the beginning: the places we have lived, the distances between friends and artists, the years that have quietly accumulated, and the moments in which music has offered somewhere to stop and simply listen. As the label begins to move at a gentler pace, it feels fitting to end this reflection on the year not with a sense of conclusion, but with those two things still open around us — time and space.
Across nearly eighteen years, Home Normal has travelled with us through moves between countries and continents, and through many of life’s most significant milestones. Throughout all of this, the label has been sustained not simply by an audience, but by an extraordinary network of friendship, generosity and belief in quiet music.
Our deepest thanks go to every artist who has entrusted us with their work, and to everyone who has listened, written, shared, purchased a release or supported the label in any form. Your care has allowed Home Normal to remain a home for ambient music and for the people who create it. Whatever pace the label takes from here, those relationships, and the music that has grown from them, will remain at its heart.
A very special thank you to Jason van Wyk and Stijn Hüwels, whose friendship, encouragement and support have meant an enormous amount to me, particularly during this period. Their presence, creativity and generosity have been an important part of Home Normal, and of my own life around it.
To everyone who has supported us along the way, as always, thank you for listening.
NOTE: All donations from this mix will go directly towards supporting the label, helping to cover our costs and physical releases into 2027. Thank you.
credits
released August 7, 2026
Various Artists — the places we carry
the places we carry — 1:51:40
Mixed and edited by Ian Hawgood
2. all roads lead to nothing — 03:42–07:00
Taken from homen216 anthéne & Far away Nebraska — great plains, released 20 February 2026.
homenormal.bandcamp.com/album/great-plains
Deeply cathartic album inspired by 70s Japanese ambient music focused on sparse arrangements of Rhodes and guitar in a modular system from Home Normal curator Ian Hawgood and David Cordero. Home Normal
Spectacular collaboration between zakè & coppice halifax. Brian (Milieu/CH) is a dear old friend, and just so happens to be my favourite electronic ambient producer. Amazing stuff from two talents. Home Normal
James Murray's long-term creation on Quiet Details is an epic, deeply melodic and carefully constructed work of rhythmic and ambient brilliance. No great surprise for followers of HN, QD, and James. Home Normal
Dreamy ambient from Tokyo's Betts(JP) that captures the impermanence of emotion in elegant washes of synth and field recordings. Bandcamp New & Notable Jun 14, 2022
On this bespoke project for quiet details, UK producer and artist Stephen James Buckley cultivates a warm. radiant ambient ecosystem. Bandcamp New & Notable Mar 27, 2025
Toronto artist Jordan Czamanski assimilates jazz, house, techno, kosmiche, and psychedelia into a stunning, protean suite. Bandcamp New & Notable Mar 9, 2025
