The Sonic Habitués of the Strip
Casino Royale, Las Vegas (October 2016)
How has neoliberalism transformed the way we hear? These recordings and photographs were taken as part of a weeklong fieldwork project in October 2016 exploring the soundscapes of the Las Vegas Strip and the ways in which gamblers listen in casinos. This research was published in an article in Sound Studies. that examines how, in a paradigmatic example of the post-Fordist attention economy, casino capital captures the psychological and affective capacities of players. In an environment where every detail is purposefully designed to increase revenues, sound design plays a very important role in keeping players in their seats and increasing the length of time they spend playing, as well as the size and speed of bets. Against the backdrop of Bernard Stiegler’s analysis of neoliberalism as a “destruction of attention,” the article draws upon two conceptual frames to analyse the modalities of listening produced on the Las Vegas Strip and to distinguish them from Adornian structural listening: (1) Martin Heidegger’s discussion of boredom and animal captivation; and (2) Félix Ravaisson’s philosophy of habit as it anticipates Catherine Malabou’s theory of plasticity.
If older casinos have a singular focus, the Aria promotes gambling as just one of a number of diverting experiences on offer including concerts and spa treatments. The slot machines and craps tables are distributed throughout a space that has the character of a luxurious hotel lounge, with eateries, sumptuous sofas and a piano bar, the smoke evaporating into the starry sky above. The soundscapes of the two types vary considerably. In the CityCenter complex the same piped music expands outside, providing a homogenous soundtrack to the art galleries, flowerbeds, contemporary sculptures, water features and designer boutiques. The slot-machine chimes recede, swamped by the singing voice, recorded during the day and live at night. My field recordings from the Aria casino, for instance, are dominated by a jazz vocalist and pianist who captures the attention of guests sipping on expensive cocktails. The dings and jangles are isolated and muted: a quick spin of the wheel or a turn at the slots is just one of many brief diversions that keep a young, affluent and cosmopolitan clientele captivated and their tedium alleviated. Casinos like the Aria capitalise on what scholars have described as increasingly distributed modes of “hyper attention” (Hayles 2007) that rapidly switch back and forth between different objects of focus.
Sights & Sounds of Las Vegas
Tourist Records (1963)
One of the few aural documents that survive from the 1960s is a sonic postcard from Las Vegas that illustrates the role played by this anticipatory attention. Part field recording and part tourism advertising, the EP’s voiceover highlights the way in which the clatter—in those days of real coins on metal trays—and the announcement of wins punctuates the soundscape at regular intervals. Since then, casino time has accelerated