Company by Disasterpiece (Music as Torture)

Music that does not please but rather displeases or tortures should "dissolve subjectivity, releasing a person into a paradoxical condition that is both highly embodied and almost disembodied in the intensity with which one forgets important elements of one’s identity," bringing them to the discomfort they have but away from thought, and to a timescale that forces one to "lose track of time’s passing." (Cusick)

I chose this song by Disasterpiece from the soundtrack to the horror movie It Follows. The music is specifically designed to keep the listener attending to something other than themselves, yet requires that they *pay attention* as only a conscious subject could react and feel in response. This track is particularly unnerving. I could not find the original motion picture online, but it is worth watching. 

The music gives a sense of foreboding when it is quiet. It uses the silence between crescendos and movements to draw on this foreboding and to stretch and confuse the listener's sense of time and anticipation, which takes far too long for what we would expect. The drums leading up to 1:06 further attune the listener's perception to a sense of dread that isn't ready to be disturbed, but the powerful synths violently interject into the time which has just gained rhythm. The long keys that are played follow the same time but because of their electronic quality do not give the listener the same sense of time's passage. In the movie, this helps to shock the viewer as an image of a phantom woman emerges, and from a listener's perspective it makes us listen more attentively to the music. 

The shock (or trauma) from this moment lasts long enough for the second crescendo to approach, which is more of a twisting of the knife to the original violent interruption that brings back the sensation while adding a layer of chaos and distortion not previously heard. This brings about the hopelessness of trauma's presence that the film itself is quite good at expressing. The impossibility of detaching one's senses from what one hears means that the more horrifying music can make you listen to it, the more it becomes a part of your lasting impression of that time in your life.