Sounds from the Bunker: Aural Culture and the Remainder of the Cold War

Abstract

This article explores the aural culture of the Cold War bunker. First by considering the insinuation of nuclear war (and attempts to survive it) into early 1980s UK popular music (and its echo in contemporaryironic or nostalgic pastiche). Secondly by examining the increasing use of decommissioned bunkers as performance venues, some as decontextualized atmospheric backdrops, others with a greater attentiveness to heritage and its interpretation. Lastly, the article considers the experience of my own act of cultural production in making a BBC Radio 4 documentary (Cold Art, broadcast in 2018) by exploring the resonant spaces of three Cold War sites, and the complex attraction these structures hold for artists and musicians. Across the article, these three instances of 'sounds from the bunker' are critically examined in order to explore the notion of the cultural politics of cultural appropriation and memory/trauma re-working, as a creative practice.