“Station 44” is a soundscape composition that uses a range of techniques for electromagnetic sonification. Its focus is the transmitting station on the topographical elevation of Mormond Hill in the furthest extremes of North East Scotland. Mormond Hill is the site of assorted communications masts and is the historical location of a Cold War facility known as Station 44.
“Station 44” incorporates themes of the Cold War while speculating on the secret operations of British and American military and intelligence services in relation to unexplained phenomena in the North East region. It is a part-factual, part-fictional soundscape depiction of the secret history of the Mormond Hill facility, using several electromagnetic sonification techniques to convey a full range of acoustic paradigms, namely: the eeriness and weirdness of a hauntological Cold War infrastructure; the technical amassment of historical and modern communications systems; the tapering metallic lacework of the phantasmagoric "antenna farm"; the creepy abandoned installation blocs; the unofficial legacies of UFO activity in the North East regions; and the esoteric practices of the Christo-pagan religious cult of St Ethernan in the 7th Century.
