The Sound of What Never Came
Rafael Ramirez
(Tsarichina—Institute of Acoustic Ruins)
Forensic Acoustics 1
(2023)
In 2021, my uncle Oscar Ramírez died along with dozens of Cubans in what we can call a biopolitical massacre. For years my uncle built his vinyl collection, to which not even listened, but continued to protect and organize. Many records he had acquired were completely broken.These records were in 20°52’27.8”N 76°20’44.9”W.
There was no time to mourn the death of Oscar Ramirez. The mourning allowed at that time by the State was the mass grave. So, I have understood these records as a mass grave, and the act of manipulating their broken bodies, as reconstructions of a forensic practice.
It is important to hear the work in its totality. It was conceived as a continuous piece, separated by these 17 stanzas. I don’t think it will help jumping around the tracks. This is a work of mourning. If you want an alternate way of listening, you can start from the last track up to the number 13th.
—Rafael Ramirez
The word “Hauntology” was coined by Jacques Derrida and refers to elements that happened in the past (either on a social, cultural, or even a personal level) that persist, unfulfilled into the current time. These elements, in their persistence and, by the gift of memory succeed in creating a “haunting” of our lived present that hangs over us like a hazy, amorphous specter. A ghost of another present that has never or could never— happen. A strand of possibility cut from its source.
The memories that lie deep in this wellspring of thought can trigger a sense of nostalgia for a potential future, and all that entails. A nostalgia for a future that will not arrive. In music, this sense of longing is often depicted with the use of static, degraded samples, manipulated scratched records, tape hiss, detuned melodies, ghostly synth pads and a general melancholic low-fi’ness to the sound. This offering by Rafael Ramirez, a sonic mourning for the unexpected loss of his uncle is a particularly gut-wrenching aural set of fragments depicting a past that once held promise but now feels shadowy and abandoned. Infinite possibilities… gone.
The composer recommends that the piece be listened from start to finish and I agree. The sounds, taken from his late uncle’s neglected and damaged vinyl record collection and manipulated by Ramirez, exude the sorrow of an erasure — in this case, the erasure of a loved one from the realm of all contingencies. As the album progresses, the future lost seems to become clearer, which makes the entire experience that much more poignant.
Perhaps we can find a way into this lost time. A focused engagement with the piece might reveal a hidden path. Starting with an intent of making yourself present to the sound, the sound will reveal more of itself to you, the listener. Presence begets presence.
We have no reason to disbelieve the composer when he says that Forensic Acoustics 1 is an attempt to reconstruct what might have been by manipulating an old, cracked record, but to get there we must consider an access point to the Eighth Climate. The Mundus Imaginalis where time is the spiral ascension around the true polar north.
As we climb, the past is not behind us but under our feet. Glitches become memory prompts in this imaginal time and lost possibilities become manifest.
Listen, and start the climb.
—Michael Eisenberg
A man conceived a moment’s answers to the dream
—Jon Anderson from “And You And I” by Yes
Staying the flowers daily, sensing all the themes
As a foundation left to create the spiral aim
A movement regained and regarded both the same
All complete in the sight of seeds of life with you
Rafael Ramirez has a Bachelor in Audiovisual Communication from the University of the Arts, Havana, Cuba. He graduated in documentary filmmaking at EICTV (San Antonio de los Baños International Film School).
His films and projects has been exhibited in festivals and venues such as Locarno Film Festival, Documenta Madrid, Documenta fifteen (Kassel), IFF Rotterdam, Mar del Plata IFF, Frames of Representation, FIC Valdivia, Doc Lisboa, FestCurtas, Frontera Sur, Neighboring Scenes, MAFIZ, IFF Rotterdam, among others.
His practice as a filmmaker and sound artist is focused on the implementation of Ethno-hauntology as a research tool for decoding ”historical imprints”. He has been a visiting professor in cinema schools and universities in Germany, Colombia, Brazil, Chile, Greece and Spain.
This sound-based project— Forensic Acoustics 1 is using the capabilities of experimental turntablism as a research tool for analyzing the specters of COVID bio-political policies in Cuba.
Be sure to check out Rafael’s bandcamp page for this album, the recently released follow up and an earlier piece from 2023. All of these are hauntingly beautiful.
This entire record is a great example of the concept of Hauntololgy in music as described in the article. If this sound interests you, I can highly recommend listening to any album by Philip Jeck who I consider one of the foremost practitioners in this sound.
Specifically, the albums Sand and Stoke both have that high level of atmosphere that sonically illustrate this “haunted” vibe.