In what appears to be an all time low for the U.S., reports came in recently saying that music was being used as a torture weapon at Guantanamo Bay. Nine Inch Nails, Drowning Pool and the music from Sesame St. were among the acts reported to be used. Needless to say, Trent Reznor is pissed.
“It’s difficult for me to imagine anything more profoundly insulting, demeaning and enraging than discovering music you’ve put your heart and soul into creating has been used for purposes of torture. If there are any legal options that can be realistically taken they will be aggressively pursued, with any potential monetary gains donated to human rights charities.”
These reports are filtering in from released prisoners, like Donald Vance, who’s employer illegally sold weapons.
Blaring from a speaker behind a metal grate in his tiny cell in Iraq, the blistering rock from Nine Inch Nails hit Prisoner No. 200343 like a sonic bludgeon.
“Stains like the blood on your teeth,” Trent Reznor snarled over distorted guitars. “Bite. Chew.”
The auditory assault went on for days, then weeks, then months at the U.S. military detention center in Iraq. Twenty hours a day. AC/DC. Queen. Pantera. The prisoner, military contractor Donald Vance of Chicago, told The Associated Press he was soon suicidal.
The tactic has been common in the U.S. war on terror, with forces systematically using loud music on hundreds of detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay. Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, then the U.S. military commander in Iraq, authorized it on Sept. 14, 2003, “to create fear, disorient … and prolong capture shock.”
Most of the musicians that heard of their music was being used in these torture situations were furious. Tom Morello, for one, said that for his tour with his acoustic project The Watchmen, he’s going to be taking minutes of scilence in remembrance of the acts used at Guantanamo Bay.
Drowning Pool, on the other hand, is stoked that they’re a part of the torture routines, which I can only assume is because no one else is buying Drowning Pool CDs.
ud that their music is used in interrogations. Those include bassist Stevie Benton, whose group Drowning Pool has performed in Iraq and recorded one of the interrogators’ favorites, “Bodies.”
“People assume we should be offended that somebody in the military thinks our song is annoying enough that played over and over it can psychologically break someone down,” he told Spin magazine. “I take it as an honor to think that perhaps our song could be used to quell another 9/11 attack or something like that.”
The band’s record label told AP that Benton did not want to comment further. Instead, the band issued a statement reading: “Drowning Pool is committed to supporting the lives and rights of our troops stationed around the world.”
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