By The Landlord
Suddenly, on Saturday, it will be 20 years ago, but the footage, the photographs, and the testimony, is still shocking, and brings shivers, even now. That thunderous, ground-splitting, apocalyptic noise, masses of metal colliding with concrete, the unimaginable sights and sounds of blood, screams, panic and death.
But in New York on 11th September 2001, at 8:46 am, when American Airlines Flight 11 hit the North Tower of the World Trade Center, what was the first thought? Most assumed it was some terrible, tragic accident, perhaps because of a pilot having a heart attack or some engine or technical failure.
But all changed when United Airlines Flight 175 hit the South Tower just 17 minutes later.
As the buildings burned, firemen and other rescue personnel mobilised, and many climbed the stairs to organise a mass evacuation in the other direction. In relative terms, of percentage numbers of people, it was mostly successful. But around or above points of impact and fires, many were still trapped, either burning alive or choosing to jump to their deaths.
And then at 9:27am American Airlines Flight 77, which initially seemed like it was heading for the White House, with a frantic Capitol also emptying (the intended target), the plane suddenly hit the Pentagon, completely unaware of this until it happened. Then, back in New York, the South Tower collapsed at 9:59am showering Manhattan in debris, followed by the North Tower 20 minutes later, the streets covered in white snow-like debris, and New Yorkers covered in dust, wandering in utter shock like demented figures from a zombie movie.
Then lastly, at 10:03am, with crew and passengers eventually fighting with the hijackers, a fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing everyone on board.
In just over an hour, the world irrevocably changed. And in total, 2,996 people died in those incidents, but that is a tiny fraction of the deaths that have resulted from it since.
So where were you when all of this happened, and how might it be marked in song? Might they be songs written on that day, or since, or even ones beforehand that foretold such events, or something similar about America's place in the world?
Might they be about shock, panic, memories of hearing of it and other major tragedies, tributes, heroism, terrorism, consequences, conspiracy theories, and how things bite back? Whatever comes to mind, but they should in some way, form, image, lyric or music, refer to the events of the 11th September 2001.
My whereabouts on that day were pretty banal. It was lunchtime in London, and I was eating pizza with some work colleagues from a design company for which I was doing some freelance writing. There, at the cafe, there were confused and unclear rumours about some plane crash in New York, but as we got back to the office, the TV went on just after the second plane hit. The day was turned upside down, and eventually I spent the afternoon helping send emails to the company's New York clients with hopes of their wellbeing and best wishes to them and their families.
Here at the Song Bar it's not always desirable to respond to every major event, as this is as much an escape from the world, as a place to interpret it, but, as last year when we addressed songs related to Covid lockdown, with this anniversary upon us, 9/11 attacks are still such a world-changing event that it's impossible to ignore.
There's a raft of documentaries around at the moment to mark the event and one which stands out relates to how much 9/11 changed the world and all of its consequences at home and abroad - wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere, CIA activities, oil grabs, and programmes of mass surveillance.
Here's a trailer for Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror:
Should 9/11 have been such a shock? Retrospectively, perhaps not. It all began 20 years earlier, when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, and the CIA intervened to fund militia to fight back against them, among other equipment supplying highly effective Stinger rocket launchers. Among the many figures they helped and trained was one Osama Bin Laden, a rogue figure from a wealthy Saudi Arabian family. Bin Laden was gripped by religious fanaticism that found its form in the Taliban and later various groups collectively termed al-Qaeda. The Soviet Union, about to collapse, finally withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, leaving the country in ruins. Among many fighting factions, was the Taliban, the most ruthless and extreme group, who immediately took control. Does that sound familiar?
The 1990s were marked by many terrorist attacks that arguably heralded what was to come, not least the the truck bomb detonated below the very same place, the North Tower of World Trade Center in February 1993 that killed six people, implemented by Ramzi Yousef and others, and financed by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Yousef's uncle. There were many other terrorist bombs from similar sources, in Algeria, France, India, Egypt, and at US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya both on 7 February 1998. On that day alone 224 people died and more than 4000 were injured. Osama Bin Laden had been detained by authorities in 1995 in Sudan and was offered to the US, but the CIA were happy for him to simply be sent Afghanistan where he would be regarded as powerless, or at least of no harm to America …
Other plots were foiled, but the US also began to get sorely distracted, first by rival factions within its own secret services who failed to communicate, but also at home on domestic matters, with Democrats and Republicans fighting about Bill Clinton and his affair with Monica Lewinsky, to the dubious presidential election of 2000, where George W. Bush, the second worst president in living memory, 'won' by virtue of a biased party decision in Florida's recount over ballot paper hanging chads.
The stage was set for a country and an administration patently far more concerned with oil interests than human lives, with Dick Cheney and others eyeing up the Middle East. And after all, of the 19 terrorists who perpetrated the 9/11 attacks 15 came from the wealthy oil nation Saudi Arabia, and none from Iran or Afghanistan, which says a lot about what happened in the war campaigns from 2001 onwards and all the atrocities committed thereafter.
And it was that moment when Bush, during a PR visit to Emma E Booker Elementary School down in Florida, was whispered in the ear by White House chief of staff Andrew Card, that a second plane had hit the South Tower and that 'America was under attack", the look on his face was one of utterly, almost childlike bewilderment, betraying the reality of a man in possession of confused, frightening incompetence.
So much is written about 9/11, It's impossible to capture it in this introduction, but I hope some quotes, random lyrics and images will help stimulate some ideas. There have been many pronouncements by presidents and other politicians about America, but let's leave aside those, and here from real people who were there. Firstly, here are some dialogues from air traffic control that fatal day and more piece of heard from personnel who lost their lives.
And then:
"I can barely breathe now – can’t see. It’s really bad, it’s black, it’s arid. We’re young men, not ready to die. – Kevin Cosgrove, 45, calling 911 from the 105th floor of the South Tower.
"Numerous civilians in the stairwells, numerous burn victims are coming down. We're trying to send them down first... we're still heading up." – New York Fire Department's Captain Patrick Brown, climbing the stairwell of the North Tower 30 before the first collapse.
"What do I tell the pilots to do?” – Barbara Olson, onboard Flight 77, asking husband General Theodore Olson for advice
And in the aftermath:
"If we learn nothing else from this tragedy, we learn that life is short and there is no time for hate." – Sandy Dahl, whose husband, Captain Jason Dahl, was the pilot of Flight 93.
And just for inspiration, some random lyrics of songs that might come up:
"I don't want to work in a building downtown;
I don't know what I'm going to do,
‘Cause the planes keep crashing,
Always two by two"
"The world watches on TV
It's all there for the whole world to see
Yeah, it took twenty minutes to change history."
“In New York, I took your photograph
I still have your smiling face
In a heart-shaped frame
Snowed in at Wheeler Street.
Just two old flames
Keeping the fire going
We look so good together.”
Over to you then. And, taking your calls on this, in the form of song nominations below, let’s welcome back the excellent Loud Atlas. The final bell will ring on Monday at 11pm BST in the UK (7pm in New York), for playlists published next week. Music, remembrance, and much more.
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