Day: May 10, 2004

My Sweet Satan

looky

Years ago someone told me that if you played Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven song backwards that you could make out “satanic messages”. It is not my opinion that Led Zeppelin was given the power to make these backwards sounds have a satanic message. And, no, I did not create this to show the evils of Rock and Roll. Instead I made this flash piece for two reasons: 1. I was new to flash and wanted to be better at it and 2. The backwards file sounds cool.

From the too-much-time-on-my-hands department:

The forwards lyrics:

If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow
don’t be alarmed now
It’s just a spring clean for the May Queen
Yes there are two paths you can go by
but in the long run
There’s still time to change the road you’re on

What people heard in the reversed lyrics:

Oh here’s to my sweet Satan
The one whose little path would make me sad
Whose power is Satan
He’ll give you give you 666
There was a little toolshed where
He made us suffer, sad Satan

My mapping of reversed sounds to forwards lyrics:

heard ” Oh ” here’s to my sweet Satan
sounds naah ohrydoahruhtttth zhehhsh o’t mai(t) eeelss et’
mapped on you’re road the change to time still there’s
lyrics There’s still time to change the road you’re on

heard The one whose little path would make me sad
sounds Nrrr Ngone ethni tahb ohg naah’c eeyy sthap
mapped runlong the in but by go can you paths
lyrics paths you can go by
but in the long run

heard Whose power is Satan
sounds ooo t au rer esthsSay’
mapped two are there Yes
lyrics Yes there are two

heard He’ll give you give you 6 6 6
sounds Eyuuuh Qyih yaymeth orrthneac pssats uhst tsih
mapped Queen May the for clean spring a just It’s
lyrics It’s just a spring clean for the May Queen

heard There was a little toolshed where he made us suffer sad Satan
sounds awn d’ma laehb’d woolshdge’ yerr’er nih elst sub seretdhif’
mapped now alarmed be don’t hedgerow your in bustle there’s if
lyrics If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow
don’t be alarmed now

UPDATE 2005-05-15:
After just over a year, the original link is dead. I’ll update it here so people can still hear it backwards… so maybe you can actually listen to it before shooting your mouth off.

Other locations:

Someday when I feel even crazier I should do a phonetic transcription in the IPA… which I believe theoretically should be easier to reverse into something just as legible as the forwards version! -brainWeb link of note: My Sweet Satan
(At http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/stairway.php)