Integrated Circuits: Colin Potter, ICR and the Cassette Network

Emerging from the same late-1970s underground that fuelled punk, DIY cassette culture, and European electronic experimentation, we explore the influence of Colin Potter - sound artist, producer, and founder of Integrated Circuit Records (ICR)

From beginnings building crude oscillators and fuzz boxes to university access to an EMS Synthi A, his path reflects a generation discovering sound through curiosity rather than convention.

We track the growth of ICR from a mail-order cassette operation into one of the UK’s most important underground labels of the early 1980s. Starting with cooperative compilation LPs and cassettes, Potter helped connect artists working across abstract electronics, industrial, cosmic music, and experimental sound - including The Instant Automatons, The Legendary Pink Dots, Carl Matthews, The Door and The Window, and many others.

We hear how Potter’s cassette duplication service became a crucial infrastructure for labels such as Third Mind Tapes. That practical role also led to deeper artistic collaborations, most notably with Nurse With Wound, Current 93, and Steven Stapleton, where Potter’s studio became a space that hosted creative risk, sonic transformation, and unconventional production.

Featuring contributions from Colin Potter, Jonathan Colclough, Gary Levermore, Mark Lancaster, this episode examines how technical generosity, and openness to experimentation helped shape the 45 years of underground electronic music released on ICR.

Hosted by Martin Franklin.
Theme music “This Is Concrete” by The Happy Citizen

DISCOVER THE VIDEO
You can find videos of cassette tapes, artefacts and unboxings from the cassette underground on our YouTube channel: youtube.com/@CassetteCulturePodcast

LINKS
Colin Potter/ICR:
https://icrdistribution.com/
https://icrdistribution.bandcamp.com/

IN THIS EPISODE

VOICES
Martin Franklin
Jerry Kranitz
Colin Potter
Jonathan Coleclough
Mark Lancaster
Gary Levermore

MUSIC

“Off The Graph” Colin Potter, The Ghost Office, Mirage
“We Are So Glad” Colin Potter, We Couldn’t Agree On a Title, (IRC001)
“The No. 1 Entertainer” The Door & The Window, Weird Noise E.P. (FO Records FEP001)
“Invertebrates” The Instant automatons, We Couldn’t Agree On A Title, LP (IRC001)
“Sentimental” Those Little Aliens, We Couldn’t Agree On a Title, LP (IRC001)
“Ismalla” Those Little Aliens, Flowmotion, (ICR 003)
“Power” Colin Potter, The Scythe, (ICR002)
“Harmless Thought” Carl Matthews, Integration, (ICR 012)
“One Million Blades Of Grass” Colin Potter, Visions, (Third Mind Tapes TMT009)
“The Self Sufficient Sexual Shoe” Nurse With Wound, Rock n Roll Station, (United Dairies)
“As Above, So Below” Carl Matthews, Flowmotion compilation, (ICR 003)

Many thanks to Jonny Zhivago and the invaluable resource for underground music that is Die Or DIY (https://dieordiy2.blogspot.com/)

FIND US
https://cassetteculturepodcast.com

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Cassette Culture is produced by Martin Franklin for East Coast Studio (https://eastcoaststudio.com.au)

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