Alex Ross, a music critic once wrote in an article. ‘We listen not only with our ears but also with our body’. The effects of psychosocial, sonic upbringing and sensorial location can play a pivotal role in the enjoyment and pleasure in noise and music. Alternatively, the adverse effect can happen with music or sounds designed to be joyous being perceived as torturous. This duality in the world of noise torture and noise music highlights the importance of the other senses and psychosocial relation to sounds around you, in framing and perceiving what constitutes a positive or negative sound. In this audio paper I will start by giving examples of noise torture pertaining to British intelligence in Northern Ireland as well as American intelligence during the Iraq war. I will give a brief overview of a noise gig I experienced recently before comparing together music and sounds used for both relaxation and torture, analysing how sounds or music can cause or psychological trauma.

During the Iraq war detainment camps like Guantanamo Bay held numerous people considered to be a threat to the United States. Prisoners were kept in dark cells with little to eat and drink, depriving them of their senses. Many people were subjected to noise torture, a constant bombardment of loud music and noise to disrupt and break down the resolve of prisoners. Attempting to extract information otherwise not unobtainable from standard forms of interrogation. Many different genres and styles of music were used. Ranging from Heavy Metal in the form of ‘Enter the Sandman’ by Metallica, to Children’s Tv theme tunes such as the Barney the dinosaur. What all these songs have in common is the lack of timbral, rhythmical and linguistic similarities between these songs and the music and sounds Iraqi prisoners would have been accustomed to. Moazzam Begg, a Pakistani-Englishman was arrested by the CIA in Pakistan in February 2002, and held in the detainment camps Kandahar, Bagram and Guantanamo. In his memoirs and interviews he highlights the attempted sensorial and cultural disorientation caused through sound. ‘They built cells for sleep deprivation, constantly playing ear-splitting heavy metal tracks by Marilyn Manson to break down new detainees.’ This deprived inmates of their ability to hear noises and sounds they may be more accustomed to and thus receive comfort from. the call to prayer is a key feature heard throughout islamic countries, dawn, noon, afternoon and sunset can be distinguished by the calls that resonate from nearby cities. Begg mentions that in the detainment camps located in Islamic countries inmates found the call to prayer ‘a comfortingly familiar sound in a place where everything else was so unfamiliar’. This highlights the guard’s attempts at removing sounds that could orient inmates chronologically or that could bring comfort. Begg goes on to say that he himself was not subjected to the music because of his exposure to western music, sounds and language. ‘In a sense the music didn’t bother me. I’d grown up in Britain, I knew what it was. But Afghan villagers, Yemenis, these guys were dazed, dazzled and confused, bewildered, completely out of it’. Without cultural and linguistic context any sound can be turned and used as a tool to produce fear and disorientation.

During the troubles in Northern Ireland of the 70s, the British military deployed for the first time the five techniques. Individuals were cuffed and hooded in a cold cell, deprived of food, sleep and subjected to a continuous loud hissing sound. A precursor to the tactics used by the US in their detainment camps, the choice of using a white noise like hissing sound relates to the close sonic ties between the two countries and their psychosocial relation to sound. Irish and British people have similar sonic cultures, similar timbral and melodic content found in the music of both countries in comparison to the US and Islamic states in the middle east. This explains the choice of sound used against Irish detainees as they would have been exposed to English music from a young age already. A hissing noise in the 70s may not have been very common and thus being exposed to such a sound at a high level and for a long period of time would have the same effect as western music has on peoples with little exposure to it.

Sounds like this are commonly found in noise music, coupled with distorted bass, the high pitched wailing of feedback and often little semblance of rhythm, why do people enjoy it? From my experience at a noise gig, the importance of your other senses as well as your exposure to the music becomes clear. Instinctual, Primitive, unconscious are the words that come to mind when experiencing harsh noise live for the first time. A couple months ago I saw Bristol based duo Bad Tracking. An improvised mess of all things related to noise set forth out of the circuitry they were manipulating. Max Kelan, the front man, walks around naked in BDSM screaming into his mic on stage. The sounds blasting so loud my ears start to go numb. Sensory overload. What makes this different to the sonic torture techniques used by both The US and the UK? Alex Ross a music critic said ‘We listen not only with our ears but also with our body’. Our exposure to different sounds in an environment where we feel comfortable increases our acceptance and enjoyment of what we hear, conditioning us into liking sounds in a social environment that otherwise would have been unpleasant beforehand. For instance, Classical music might be most useful for inflicting sonic torture on noise gig goers.

//Talk about findings when framing sounds in different environments and how this can be used to further the development of noise music and the importance of psychosocial relations to sound in general//