Devil's Music: The Satanic Panic Paranoia of Pastor Gary Greenwald

Anyone who was around in the 1980s, esp. music fans, remembers well the 'Satanic Panic' that swept that era, at least in America (did this happen elsewhere?). Apart from ruining lives by claiming that perfectly innocent people were killing children on Satanic altars (despite that fact that not one corpse was ever found), crazy fundies also waged war against pop music, seeking hidden and not-so-hidden messages from the Evil One hisself. They analyzed lyrics and album covers, and played records backwards, claiming that 'subliminal messages' effected human behaviour.  I wish humans were that easy to manipulate.  We could put on backwards messages saying: "Don't murder. Don't wage war. Stop watching 'American Idol' and listening to crap music." And the world would be a better place.

Orange County, CA pastor Gary Greenwald got a lot of mileage out of this hysteria, selling the sermon/lecture tape presented here, as well as appearing on tv. A friend of mine back in my school days videotaped one such appearance, invited us all over to watch, and we had a regular Prince of Darkness par-teee. Oh! how we joked about it for ages.  Not only did it not scare me off pop music, I remember thinking that the clip he played from "Animals" was pretty cool. Pink Floyd sez: thanks for the free publicity, Pastor Greenwald!

You had to have a good imagination to find these allegedly hidden messages. They'd play something backwards that supposedly said "Worship Satan, kill yourself, don't vote for Reagan," but all it sounded like to me was "Wurp-nya glurp, wobwob, yob rulb." Towards the end of part 1 of the tape and the beginning of part 2 you'll hear what happens when they played some Christian records backwards!

Apart from the unexpected nostalgia blast this tape gave me, there was another eye-opening moment. I realized: hey, that's where DJ Loberdust got the sample for his classic mashup "It's Fun to Smoke Dust (Queen vs Satan)"! I maintain that it really sounds like the backwards Freddy Mercury is saying "It's HARD to smoke marijuana," not "It's fun..." But that of course, would turn it into an anti-drug song, ruining the pastor's point.

Pastor Gary Greenwald: Rock a Bye Bye Baby 1
Pastor Gary Greenwald: Rock a Bye Bye Baby 2

Part 2 gets cut off, but he's just yammering on about how eeeeevil Jim Morrison was.  Thanks again to windy - you are truly doing the lord's work.

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