Displacing the Past. Mediated Nostalgia and Recorded Sound

Abstract

The audio past of the 20th century, as it is stored in both material and digital collections, is largely and almost effortlessly accessible to contemporary audiences. The recycling or revival of former musical pasts seems to be an inescapable and familiar reality (Reynolds, 2011). In light of two case studies borrowed from contemporary British audio culture, I determine how nostalgia has become a strong, yet paradoxical, shaping practice for contemporary independent record labels. The first case study is dedicated to Ghost Box records and examines the prevailing practices of hauntology and sampling. The second case study focuses on hyper-specialised British reissue record label Finders Keepers, which help to salvage and rehabilitate semi-forgotten recordings from bygone eras. In this article, the notion of nostalgia is constructed as a relevant dimension of contemporary audio cultures rather than its superficial (or fashionable) correlative. The links between early phonography as a technology of early presence and the rise of nostalgia are also discussed.

Reissuing Indonesian Independent Music: Technology-Mediated Nostalgia, Hauntology and Future Projection

“…Elodie A. Roy wrote "Displacing the Past: Mediated Nostalgia and Recorded Sound" published in the Volume! : Le revue des musiques popularizes journal [5]. In this article, Roy analized practices conducted by two recording labels from England, Ghost Box and Finder Keepers, in bringing the past into the present through music releases.…”

“…It reveals duality of recording products. According to Roy [5], eventhough past content is intangible (immaterial), it still contained in the form of recording release materials and needs a driving tool in order to produce sound.…”

Echoic survivals: Re-documenting pre-1975 Vietnamese music as historical sound/tracks of re-membering

“…It seems indeed inevitable that everything which is and has been preserved in matter is likely to be encountered again, and potentially recycled and This assertion of the past being omnipresent focuses on the idea that everything can be recorded. As Roy (2014) suggests, recorded sounds can generate "an everyday multisensorial experience" that is "induced" by nostalgic longing (p. 147). Similarly, music recorded and produced during the Việt Nam War holds onto this cultural and historical past.…”

“…This longing to return to a past is part of audial memories, often elicited from sounds or songs. Considering the connections between recorded sound and nostalgia, Elodie A. Roy (2014) writes,The cultural past is everywhere. It seems indeed inevitable that everything which is and has been preserved in matter is likely to be encountered again, and potentially recycled and re-assimilated.…”

Reissue programmes

“…What kind of particular cultural mechanisms allow for reissue practices to take place? What kind of relationships to 'contemporary' regimes of memory do reissue cultures betray (Roy 2014(Roy , 2015? These general questions can only be answered by identifying particular articulations, colourations and singular occurrences of reissuing.…”