BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Gray's warning on 'torture' music (original) (raw)

Babylon reached number five in the UK and 57 in the US

Singer David Gray has warned that US interrogators playing loud music as a form of "torture" - including his own song Babylon - was no laughing matter.

"Only the novelty aspect of this story gets it noticed... Guantanamo greatest hits," he said.

"What we're talking about here is people in a darkened room, physically inhibited by handcuffs, bags over their heads and music blaring at them."

His track Babylon is reportedly a favourite of US interrogators in Iraq.

	It doesn't matter what the music is - it could be Tchaikovsky's finest or it could be Barney the Dinosaur

Repeatedly playing loud music to suspected terrorist detainees is also a standard interrogation technique in Guantanamo and other US bases.

"That is torture," the singer-songwriter told BBC Radio 4's The World Tonight.

"That is nothing but torture.

"It doesn't matter what the music is - it could be Tchaikovsky's finest or it could be Barney the Dinosaur.

"It really doesn't matter, it's going to drive you completely nuts."

He said such torture formed part of a US "retaliation to a few terrorist acts".

"No-one wants to even think about it or discuss the fact that we've gone above and beyond all legal process and we're torturing people," he added.

Babylon - from his White Ladder album - was Gray's breakthrough single, reaching number five in the UK in 2000.

White Ladder reached number one in the UK and number 35 in the US.