MELTING by ABADIR

"Abadir’s montages and collages create constellations for the listener to explore. The politically charged connects to the superficially pragmatic and exposes overlaps between the two. Generating an essay-like montage somewhere between Negativland and The Arcades Project, Abadir delivers a radically askance glance on past and present alike."
- Daryl Worthington, The Quietus -

"By melting about 500 cuts from TV and radio archives, found footage, commercials, forgotten songs, movies, pop trends, internet culture, and other sources of sound that whisper or shout in listeners’ ears, “Melting” engages with the romanticized consumerist vision of the past as portrayed by big corporations, capitalist entities, and authoritarian regimes.

“Melting” is an antidote to the false promises of capitalism and an invitation to engage with the past in a non-romanticized way. It is not about celebrating the past by completely submitting to nostalgia, reviving it through (sonic) citation and mourning for the ‘glorious old days.’ Rather, it is about artistically exploring the effect of late capitalism’s nostalgia and thereby criticizing it. On a conceptual level, it is a call to reclaim agency over the past; an attempt to connect with people through shared experiences and collective memory manifested through a mesh of sounds. Melting is jumping from one mental state to another, a flat archive of distant and close memories. It is a blend of humor and darkness, nightmare and joy; a trip through different human emotions that listeners are invited to connect with.

Melting was submitted as part of my master’s thesis in “Digital Media” at the University of Arts Bremen. For more info check the website designed by Iulia Radu: https://abadir-melting.netlify.app/

I would like to thank my supervisors Petra Klusmeyer and Dennis Paul for their generous support throughout the process of working on my thesis. I would also like to thank Iulia Radu for her great work on the website, and Nabeela Roshdy for creating the website’s artwork."

-Rami Abadir-

Special thanks to Amira Elmasry

ABADIR (Rami Abadir) is a music producer, sound designer, DJ and music critic born in Cairo, Egypt and based in Berlin, Germany.

His work combines experimental, club and ambient music, and deals with themes inspired by fiction, memory and cultural artefacts. His albums were released on SVBKVLT, Genot Centre, Hush Hush, Yerevan Tapes, Kaer’Uiks among many other labels. Abadir holds a master’s degree in digital media from the University of Arts Bremen.

الصَوْت الخام غَيْر المُعالج للبَرَابِرَة قُطّاع الطُرُق والمُهَمَّشين والمُتَشَرِّدين والهَمَج، إلّا أن قُلُوبُهُم رَقِيقَة

𝙑𝙤𝙞𝙘𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙛𝙖𝙘𝙚 𝙩𝙤 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙢𝙖𝙧𝙜𝙞𝙣𝙖𝙡𝙞𝙨𝙚𝙙 𝙗𝙧𝙪𝙩𝙚𝙨, 𝙢𝙞𝙨𝙛𝙞𝙩𝙨, 𝙨𝙖𝙫𝙖𝙜𝙚𝙨 𝙗𝙪𝙩 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙙𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙘𝙖𝙩𝙚 𝙖𝙩 𝙝𝙚𝙖𝙧𝙩.

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