"Born in Montreal, Cal Lyall studied electronic composition and jazz performance in Quebec, eventually moving westward in Canada to teach music and perform. An interest in diverse musical forms led to intense travel and study throughout Southeast Asia and the Subcontinent, including lengthy visits to India, Pakistan and Iran. A visit to Japan in 1998 led to long-term residency in Tokyo, where he is currently active as a sound artist focusing on improvisation, folk music and urban noise.

Involved in the arts scene in Japan for over fifteen years, he has organized large-scale performances involving both Japanese and overseas artists, while also remaining a key member of a number of musical groups which have toured both locally and internationally. His musical activities are documented on over 30 albums he has both produced (including three full-length compilations released on medama records in Japan) and contributed to as a writer or musician. As a curator, he established the monthly Test Tone concert series in 2005 at Tokyo's SuperDeluxe. Featuring over a thousand distinct artists over its 9 year run, it reached its 100th installment in 2014.

With an active performance schedule in Japan and past tours through Thailand, Laos, Indonesia, China, Korea, Australia and the US, he also heads up the Subvalent record label and oversees the Tokyo Hub of Jolt Sonic Arts (Australia)."

"The music of Tim Olive arises from collaboration with fellow musicians/sound artists, collaboration with physical and temporal setting, and collaboration with those involved in the act of listening. Using simple materials (magnetic pickups, steel strings, tuning forks, metal strips, hand-wound motor mechanisms, magnetic tape, dental floss and analog electronics), Olive's work examines presence and the present, the interplay of the human with material/time/space, and the uniqueness, intensity and unrepeatability that lives in each performing and/or recording situation.

He is interested in music as a social activity, as a way of creating community, a way of countering the forces which lead to an increasing atomization of contemporary life; music as a felt experience rather than as a concept or a theory.

A Canadian residing in Kobe, Japan, Olive has released music on Japanese, European and North American labels, with Jeff Allport, Cristian Alvear, Pascal Battus, Alfredo Costa Monteiro, Samuel Dunscombe, Nick Hoffman, Anne-F Jacques, Jin Sangtae, Jason Kahn, Takahiro Kawaguchi, Francisco Meirino, Katsura Mouri, Takuji Naka, Makoto Oshiro and Ben Owen.

Olive has performed/recorded in Asia, Australia, North America and Europe, with the recording collaborators listed above, as well as with Akiyama Tetuzi, Maria Chavez, Che Chen, Kelly Churko, crys cole, Joe Foster, Haco, Hong Chulki, Bonnie Jones, Richard Kamerman, Kostis Kilymis, Siew-Wai Kok, Madoka Kouno, Tomasz Krakowiak, Fangyi Liu, James Rushford, Carl Stone, Fritz Welch, Nate Wooley, Jared Xu and Yan Jun.

In addition to organizing events in Japan, Olive runs the label 845 Audio."