the soundtrack - and structuring device - of
untitled (camera roll) uses a degraded version of Sisters by Arca. this version was found on promo copies of the album sent out for review and features long bursts of harsh noise in single or both audio channels at various points throughout the track.
at least one review (but i believe it was multiple) for a major publication at the time wrote about this track - and in particular this use of noise and distortion - as a central thesis of what was being done on the album. later, the album is released and the track does not feature the noise..
this incident stuck with me, and came back to me when i was working on this film. an early, shorter, version had a concrete collage of field recordings that related to the source images but the linear narrative that provided didn’t sit right with the intent of the film. i wanted something that felt like a solid object to inform the edit, something that emphasis the distorting nature of the space between the analogue/digital transfer, and something that is simultaneously losing data and building more than there originally was.
back
expanding or clarifying on a q&a question regarding the sound in untitled (camera roll) after the kinet media screening in madrid.
this aspect of the film doesn’t really come up often - and avoided emphasising it for certain reasons - but i think having the actual process laid out is more useful especially when people may recognise the source.