::: murmer ::: mill:liminal :::
CD+DL, deep mapping, 2026
it is a roundabout path that led to the making of ‘mill:liminal’. my relationship with the mill began in 2009, when i began using their paper to package releases by the publishing wing of framework radio, framework editions. in 2015, as the mill was making the paper that would be used for the framework500 release, i had the idea to document the creation process and use the sounds and images for the release itself, and the mill’s manager, Mihkel Peedimaa, graciously agreed. i found the mill, and its sounds and images, absolutely fascinating, hypnotic, meditative, and ghostly. many recordings from those initial sessions can be heard in the online version of the framework500 release. my one regret was that, given that much of the hypnotic aspect of the space was due to its movement, i had only still images. i began dreaming about returning to the mill one day to make a film.
it was soon after, through discussions with danny allen, who would become my co-director, and the wonderful argentinian filmmaker rubén guzmán, visiting for tartu’s worldfilm festival of ethnographic cinema, that that dream turned into a plan. later that year, with mihkel’s generously granted access, danny and i began exploring the mill with camera and microphone, capturing masses of material over several months of filming. in 2018, we finally finished our film, ‘the mill’, an experimental observational documentary.
i had always intended to work further with the sounds gathered in the process of making ‘the mill’. i played several live performances over the next few years with them, but never got around to working with them in the studio – or hit creative dead ends when i did. finally, this year, as a result of deep mapping’s invitation to release a new work, i came back to them, and ‘mill:liminal’ is the result. i think the long break from these sounds is what made it possible.
so the paper led me to the sounds, which led me to the images, which led me to the film, which has led me back to the sounds, which has also led me back to the paper, as the sleeve for the physical version of this release has been printed on stock from the mill.
‘mill:liminal’ is both documentary and not. the ‘mill’ chapters are untreated (and layered, though only in ‘mill i’) sounds from the mill, straight observational frameworks from the space. the ‘liminal’ chapters are dream meditations composed to reflect time spent in the space, and reflections on the visual impact of the hypnotic movement within it. ‘mill i’ and ‘liminal vi’ were composed for and appear in the film; all other pieces were composed in 2026 after not having heard the sounds of the mill for several years.
the aspect of the mill that most marked me during the time we spent there was the human presence (or lack thereof) within it. as can be seen in the film, human participation occurs at the very beginning of the process (gathering waste material from the input warehouse and feeding it into the system), and the very end (removing the newly milled paper from its final stage and moving it to the output warehouse). but in between, the mill seems to be a living entity, operating autonomously without interference, taking the stock through all its processes in sometimes 100-year-old machines, without the distraction of human hands or footfalls. the spaces are alive with movement and sound, but spacious and empty of people, and if you have the chance to explore them it can feel as if you are the first human to invade the mill’s privacy in decades. this feeling of wonder, of being inside a living organism, of discovery of secret detail, is what brought about the atmospheres of the ‘liminal’ chapters of this piece; an awe and respect for a living space that has let you in.
the cd version of this release comes packaged in a sleeve constructed from paper made at the räpina paberivabrik and letterpressed by ben owen at middle press in nyc, and comes with a printed set of photos taken at the mill by lauri kulpsoo.
::: liner notes :::
- mill i 06:51
- liminal i 07:50
- liminal ii 14:30
- mill ii 06:01
- liminal iii 12:59
- mill iii 06:03
- liminal iv 09:35
sounds found at räpina paberivabrik, a southeast estonian papermill that has been producing paper since 1734, making it the oldest continuously operating industrial enterprise in the country
sounds gathered 2015
mill i & liminal iv composed 2017
all others composed 2026
mastered by flavien gillié 2026
mill:liminal is a sonic companion to the film the mill by patrick tubin mcginley & daniel edward allen 2018
watch the mill: murmerings.com/themill
deep mapping 2026