Tape 15: ice machine, Newark Ave

Fri 6 Nov, 01:12. Newark Avenue near Summit, Jersey City. Ice merchandiser outside a bodega that closed at midnight. Handheld recorder plus two contact mics on the left side panel, gaffer tape, 48 kHz / 24-bit. 4:38. 6 °C, wind from the west.

0:00 to 1:50: compressor running. Steady hum at 60 Hz with a rattle around 1.2 kHz from a loose screw on the condenser grille. I checked. It is the left one.

1:51: the compressor cuts out. Inside the box, ice settles in three separate drops over eleven seconds. Then the panel ticks as the metal cools.

3:20: a bus passes on the far side of the street. Through the contact mics it arrives as a low push, not a sound.

4:02: compressor restarts. A short groan, then the hum again, half a step lower than before.

It runs about nine minutes in every fifteen. Nobody buys ice at one in the morning. It keeps the ice anyway.