One of several projects inaugurated by Sonic Boom (b. Peter Kember, 19 November 1965, Rugby, Warwickshire, England) following the break-up of Spacemen 3 in 1991, Experimental Audio Research aka E.A.R. has been the main outlet for his experiments with ambient textures and soundscapes. E.A.R.'s 1994 debut, Mesmerised, was a Kember solo project, but was actually recorded after the follow-up Beyond The Pale. Recorded in 1992 but not released until 1996, the latter album was more in keeping with the nature of the E.A.R. project, with collaborators including Kevin Shields (My Bloody Valentine), Kevin Martin (God, Techno Animal), and Eddie Prévost (AMM). Beyond The Pale was also remixed by German minimalist composer Thomas Köner and released in 1997 as The Köner Experiment.
A larger group of musicians joined Kember and Prévost on 1996's Phenomena 256 and 1998's Millennium Music, which balanced the sonic experimentation with a band playing largely conventional instruments (albeit heavily treated). Following these releases, Kember ventured into more abstract territory as he began experimenting with circuit bent instruments on the solo recordings Data Rape (1998), the Vibrations mini-album (2000), and Continuum (2001). The latter two releases featured contributions from pioneering electronic musician Delia Derbyshire (formerly of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop), although she died before Continuum was released. Kember has also recorded with US post-rock band Jessamine (the live Living Sound).
