Introduction

In recent years, there has not only been an emerging interest in soundtracks in audiovisual culture but also an interest in the less solid spectral aspects of culture more generally. The turn of the Millennium has heralded a significant outgrowth of culture that demonstrates an awareness of the ephemeral nature of history and the complexity underpinning the relationship between location and the past. This has been especially apparent in the contemplation of the shifting relationship between landscape, memory and sound in film, television and beyond.
This collection of essays focuses in particular on audiovisual forms that foreground landscape, sound and memory. The scope of inquiry for this collection of essays emphasises the ineffable ghostly qualities of a certain body of soundtracks, extending beyond merely the idea of “scary films: or “haunted houses”. Rather, the notion of sonic haunting is tied to ideas of trauma, anxiety or nostalgia associated with spatial and temporal dislocation in contemporary society. Touchstones for our approach are the concepts of psychogeography and hauntology, pervasive and established critical strategies that are interrogated and refined in relation to the reification of the spectral within the soundtracks under consideration here.