Radio Kills
2007
Radio Kills is a sound collage inspired by the heavy-metal cult movie Trick or Threat (1986) in which a record played backwards contains subliminal messages that encourage violence and murder. In Radio Kills it is the radio to be heard backwards: Italian music, commercial, religious and political radio stations. Like Trick or Threat, Radio Kills contains subliminal messages too: a speech that Guglielmo Marconi recorded in 1932 where the inventor of the radio recalls the basic steps of the birth of the wireless transmissions from 1901 to 1920. Radio Kills is a reflection on the role of radio in the history of technological revolutions and the importance of the city of Bologna in the evolution of the uses of this medium, as birthplace of Marconi but also of the pirate radio station Radio Alice in the 1970s. Radio Kills was founded by the invitation of American artists Christopher Williams and John Kelsey (Bernadette Corporation / Reena Spaulings) to participate in Radio Danièle, an experimental radio program broadcasted in 2007 in Bologna and Zurich.
Radio Kills has been produced by Starlab Productions and Silver Fuckin' Records as a 10 inches vinyl record in edition of 100 numbered copies. The total lenght is 17:22 minutes. In 2008 it was featured in Pawnshop, a project by e-flux, New York. It could be found at Printed Matter, New York.
