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My mom listened to Broadway musical soundtracks and the vocal stylings of Sergio Franchi, while my dad preferred barbershop quartet records and Dixieland jazz. When they were both home they chose the safe middle ground of Mantovani & His Orchestra or the 101 Strings, both of which were so soporific that I had to sprint through the living room where it was playing softly lest I would fall asleep mid-stride and tip over.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s been said that if all dogs ran and bred freely throughout time, all dogs today would be medium-size and brown. I\u2019m not sure what the result would be if all musicians ran and breeded freely. It could be 101 Strings or Mantovani, or it could be Zappa and Captain Beefheart, depending on the dominant musical genes and the outcome of certain wars.<\/p>\n
But there hasn\u2019t been rampant cross-breeding in music. There\u2019s been a little intra-family hanky-panky (on my deathbed, my biggest regret will be the time I squandered on Jean-Luc Ponty\u2019s jazz fusion), but there remain as many distinct categories of music as there are AKC-recognized breeds of dogs. And each has its own set of rabid fans who, over the years, have actually weaponized music to use aggressively against the musical enemy, whether that enemy is a prisoner of war, a barricaded cult, a gaggle of loitering teens or an encampment of homeless sleepers.<\/p>\n
When ousted Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega was taking refuge in the Papal Nunciatura in Panama City in 1989, members of the U.S. Army\u2019s psyops squad, noting that Noriega was an opera fan, put together a polar-opposite playlist that included the Clash\u2019s \u201cI Fought the Law,\u201d Alice Cooper\u2019s \u201cNo More Mr. Nice Guy\u201d and Guns N\u2019 Roses\u2019 \u201cWelcome to the Jungle\u201d and blasted the music at the building in which Noriega was hiding. The tactic was dismissed as silly and trivial and appeared to have no effect on its intended victim. Apparently Noriega was one of those people who claim to enjoy all sorts of music, a statement that\u2019s never true. He did surrender eventually, but it wasn\u2019t because of the Clash.<\/p>\n
Music has long been used as a form of torture, from raps by Eminem to the theme song from Barney (\u201cI Love You\u201d) to Metallica\u2019s metal, but I can\u2019t think of anything worse than the U.S.\u2019s use of repeated plays of the Meow Mix jingle during the War on Terror to wrest confessions from terrorists.<\/p>\n
Prolonged playing of songs including Tibetan chants, Christmas carols and Nancy Sinatra\u2019s \u201cThese Boots Are Made for Walkin\u2019,\u201d along with other random noises, at intense volume were famously used to try to get Branch Davidians to surrender at the 1993 Waco siege, prompting one negotiator to remark, \u201cIf they go Barry Manilow, it\u2019s excessive force.\u201d<\/p>\n