To coincide with the release of their fifth studio album, “The Girl With A Hole in Her Heart”, A Man Called Adam (AMCA) undertook a five-week residency at the Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (MIMA) in 2023, facilitated by a technical partnership with Pioneer DJ & ProAudio.

Embedded within MIMA's critically acclaimed exhibition "People Powered: Stories from the River Tees" (developed in collaboration with The National Portrait Gallery), AMCA unveiled a site-specific sonic installation in the museum's atrium gallery. This work (commissioned by curator Claire Pounder) articulating community narratives centred on the River Tees, created a sonorous dialectic with photographer Gilmar Ribeiro's "river portraits" to expand the discourse around place-identity and collective memory.

A Man Called Adam Soundscape – People Powered: Stories From the River Tees
Listen here

The residency's cornerstone was a series of carefully curated Sunday Music Sessions that interrogated the vibrant cultural production and sonic genealogy of Teesside. Dr. Sally Rodgers and Dr. Steve Jones activated MIMA's institutional space with ambient, experimental and dub DJ sets, live performances and participatory discussions with local cultural producers.

Rodgers' curatorial intervention – a North East focused vinyl archive (featuring Bad Company, Maximo Park, Prefab Sprout, The Rah Band, Roxy Music, among others) – invited visitors to engage directly with the region's sonic artifacts through Pioneer's state-of-the-art sound system, disrupting conventional museum engagement paradigms.

Selection from the Teesside Vinyl Collection Listen here

Robin Dale & A Man Called Adam – People Powered: Stories from the River Tees Listen here

Timeline:

July 22 – Exhibition opening and album launch event

August 6 – Guests Press On Vinyl discuss their rapid emergence within vinyl manufacturing.

August 13 – "Remembering The Rock Garden" – critical re-evaluation of Middlesbrough's seminal punk/new wave venue that hosted influential performances by The Clash and Siouxsie and the Banshees.

August 20 – "Over The Border" – examination of Teesside's pioneering nightclub and first Reggae venue, The Bongo Club, exploring its transcultural impact through dub and reggae.

August 27 – "The Teesside Scene" – interdisciplinary forum featuring journalists, artists, and cultural mediators examining contemporary cultural production in Teesside's diverse musical ecosystem, with performances, spoken word and talks.

This ambitious residency successfully negotiated the intersection between academic rigor and communal celebration, creating a platform for critical engagement with Teesside's rich sonic heritage and contemporary cultural production.