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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Daniel Dylan Wray

‘We made horse semen into little shakers’: the quest for music’s most extreme sounds

Why the long face? Matthew Herbert, who created instruments from a dead horse’s body.
Why the long face? Matthew Herbert, who created instruments from a dead horse’s body. Photograph: Eva Vermandel

‘I didn’t shoot a horse to make this record,” clarifies Matthew Herbert. “I just scoured for sounds of horses being shot and having sex … although that did get me into slightly dodgy internet territory.”

The experimental electronic musician and artist may not have slain a horse for his latest record, The Horse, but he did use a skeleton of one. “I found [it] on eBay and it only had a day left,” he recalls. “So I had to make a decision really quickly whether to go for it.” He went for it. “Then I realised I’ve got a dead horse in the corner of my studio,” he laughs. “I didn’t have the space to assemble it, I didn’t know what I was doing, it smelt a bit, so I left it there for a couple of weeks.”

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