Thursday, October 22, 2009

Rocking Guantanamo

Life irritates art as leading musicians join a Freedom of Information suit to discover how loud rock was used as an instrument of torture against Guantanamo detainees.

Members of REM, Pearl Jam and Nine Inch Nails want to know details of when and how their work was employed to break down terror suspects, although the CIA insists that the sounds were "not for punitive purposes--and at levels far below a live rock band."

Not so, says a Human Rights group's report, which insists one suspect was grilled while being "exposed to variable lighting patterns" and repeated playing of a song called "Let the Bodies Hit the Floor" by the band Drowning Pool.

If the CIA interrogators were using the music this way, they may very well have been inspired by a Woody Allen character in his 1986 movie, "Hannah and Her Sisters," who cringes during a rock band performance.

"I'm afraid," he says, "once they're done singing they're going to take hostages!"

The Guantanamo disc jockeys could have been humane enough at least to mix in a little Cole Porter or Rodgers and Hart.

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