This being the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, I feel it is necessary to reflect on that time in this day and age when internet algorithms now threaten to blot out the evidence and reorganize our collective memory of the events. Like my audience, I feel it is imperative that we never forget the outrages of that day as they precipitated the fabrication of a diabolical fantasy world in which we all demand truth whilst having to contend with the forces of evil working in the hearts and minds of men and women in power. 

Here in Japan, I remember talking to a friend on the phone as we watched news coverage of the North Tower burn. The commentary and images were mesmerizing and, in keeping with programs of fear propaganda, very likely intended to be. It was late evening here, with a typhoon slowly rolling over the island, and my gut was busy processing absinthe, cashews, and the shocking scenes. As my friend and I discussed the possible meaning of this unfolding spectacle, we observed the second plane hit the South Tower. Silence hung in the air as we both tried to comprehend what our eyes were beholding.

A couple days later, a friend and colleague at a neighboring university called me and asked me to try to explain to him the cause of the collapse of WTC7 on the very same day the towers exploded into monstrous pyroclastic clouds of soot. I had no idea what he was talking about since I was still largely hypnotized by the story of the Twin Towers. 

He suggested I pay much closer attention to the round-the-clock reports on the BBC and CNN covering the events and the sporadic stories about the “Solomon Brothers Building” as framed by the BBC. As he explained to me what he was seeing, I confessed that I knew nothing about the official claims surrounding the collapse. At last, when I was finally able to see a report, I simply observed the behavior of the building in the footage. Initially, I tried to rationalize how a 47-story steel-framed structure of such enormity could collapse at freefall acceleration in its own footprint. The symmetry of the collapse was clearly characteristic of all other controlled demolitions I had seen, but this, I felt, was different. Surely, I tried to reason with my friend, the building must have been hollowed out by fire. 

As weeks faded into months, we both learned how the official story of WTC7 foisted on the public was no more than a spectacular fairytale backed by an elaborate and highly organized propaganda campaign. We observed how major corporate media tarred and feathered anyone with the temerity to question any aspect of the events and their official codification in the 9/11 Commission Report. We watched how newfangled interpretations of Newtonian physics were in play at NIST. A buckled column was to blame for the universal failure? We observed how the BBC attempted to undermine the science of physical chemistry. 

On the 10th anniversary of 9/11, my colleague and I were invited to present a paper at a conference at the University of Brighton, “The ‘9/11’ Decade: Rethinking Reality.” We were rather keen to see whose reality was being reimagined. Many fascinating presentations were given by scholars from universities around the world. The closing plenary, however, was for me the highlight of the event. When the organizer invited questions from the gathered audience, I pointed out that the sessions I’d attended featured some important and thought-provoking analysis. It was striking, though, that no one at the conference had given any attention to the most puzzling aspect of 9/11 — the inexplicable sudden collapse of WTC7. The sideways stares and uncomfortable silence that ensued produced in me immediate beads of perspiration along my receding hairline. My colleague and I didn’t fully realize it during the conference, but we learned the hard way that certain probing questions simply cannot be posed in a simulacrum posing as a liberal democracy. 

Since the conference in Brighton, we have puzzled over how political expedients can fundamentally alter empirical reality. If the Western academy has since been largely co-opted by these political forces, we reasoned that another medium of communication might break the hypnotic trance corporate forms of journalism (propaganda) have induced in populations around the world.

Our modest effort in a musical response has produced some signs that the truth is pouring into the public consciousness. Like the crumbling 9/11 narrative, we can learn much from observers on the scene during that fateful day: “Keep your eye on that building, it’s coming down.”