On July 12th, 2010, several medias in the state of Oklahoma have been reporting that three teenagers were sent to the principal’s office after trying what seems to be a  “digital drug”. Young people plug into “i-dosers” through putting on headphones and downloading music and tones that create a supposed drug-like euphoria. “Drug like euphoria” ? woohoo big deal …However, you can’t really classify these “i-drugs” as narcotics. And for a good reason: the doses are just sound files produced using the Binaural Beats technique. As usual, the news has been spreading around the internet and it now seems to be a major concern for american parents. Anyway, I had a quick look at google trends and it shows that the i-dosing is not really recent and has been around since 2006. So why such an alarmist rhetoric only NOW ? Of course, you can find tons of videos on youtube showing kids “getting high” on waves. One more moral panic related to internet … 

The obvious question that arise first: is that coming from Suggestive Power, Placebo or real effects ?

Sound can surely affect people, it has been known for years now. Music Therapy is used in medicine, from people who need a simple stress management to those having serious mental illness. But It also can be used as a weapon. I am currently writing a blog article about the origins of this. The most recent example of torture by sound is Guantanamo where white noise was commonly used as long as some other non-lethal means so that prisoners may be stressed to yield their secrets without violating the US law. Even an association has been created in america for this kind of torture: It is called ZeroDB.

I havent try i-dosing but after watching these videos, what I feel is just a bunch of youngsters looking for a bit of action, having real fun listening to drones and discovering new soundscapes. I understand you can feel weird listening to this kind of stuff after being into mainstream or more accessible music for years. I see this as an opportunity to have more people into experimental music and not fucking drugs …