History Main / MindControlMusic

->''You see, Dipper, music has subliminal mind control hidden in it all the time. If you listen closely, even the music I play in the gift shop has subtle, hidden messages."''
-->-- '''Grunkle Stan''', ''GravityFalls'', "Boyz Crazy"

* In ''Film/HocusPocus'' the witches keep the adults from stopping them using the song "I Put A Spell On You".

This is the preferred method of the EnthrallingSiren, and indeed pops up a lot in mythology. Subtrope of MagicMusic. Inverted by the TheMusicMeister who uses MindManipulation to make music

* The cover of the ''ComicBook/TeenTitans'' [[http://superdickery.com/images/stories/stupor/ttv1_46.jpg issue 46]] shows a villain called the Fiddler using his music to make the Titans kill each other.

* The cover of the ''ComicCook/TeenTitans'' [[http://superdickery.com/images/stories/stupor/ttv1_46.jpg issue 46]] shows a villain called the Fiddler using his music to make the Titans kill each other.

* ''{{Help}}'' - in an scene dropped from the final movie, TheBeatles, at an acting school, are put into a trance by droning music played by Clang and his thugs. A scene that was used has them trying again, all crammed in a phone booth calling the band up while they're in Scotland Yard. Clang intones "Go...to...the...''window!''...Go...to...the...''window!''"

->''"Using music to control people. Why does that sound so familiar"''

* The title character of ''Literature/ThePiedPiperOfHamelin''. Initially, it seems like he's limited to controlling rats, but when the town stiffs him on his bill, he reveals similar hypnotic power over children.

-->And the singing began.\\

He knew then that the Dark had its own way of putting even an Old One outside Time for a space, if they needed a space for their own magic.

[[folder: Fan Works]]
* In Fanfic/RainbowDoubleDashsLunaverse, Thrash Metail uses this to draw his huge crowds. He's not that good of a musician, but he enchants his live performances with Euphoria spells, and the crowds think he's the best artist in town. He's also used it more offensively, trying to brainwash Octavia into recommending him to her elite, rich, and powerful clients, and then brainwashing Octavia's friend Paperweight to control her more effectively.

[[/folder]]

* SusanCooper's novel ''Literature/TheDarkIsRising''. Will is about to experience the power of the Dark.

* SusanCooper's novel ''TheDarkIsRising''. Will is about to experience the power of the Dark.
->And the singing began.
->It was wordless; it came in the wind; it was a thin, high, cold whine with no definable tune or pattern. It came from a long way off, and it was not pleasant to hear. But it held him transfixed, turning his thoughts away from their proper direction, turning them away from everything except contemplation of whatever happened to be closest at hand. [snip] As he listened to the singing, he saw a twig on a low branch of the beech close to his head that seemed for no reason so totally enthralling that he could do nothing but gaze at it, as if it contained the whole world. He stared for so long, his eyes moving very gradually along the tiny twig and back again, that he felt as if several months had passed, while the high, strange singing went on and on in the sky from its distant beginnings. And then suddenly it stopped, and he was left standing dazed with his nose almost touching a very ordinary beech twig.
->He knew then that the Dark had its own way of putting even an Old One outside Time for a space, if they needed a space for their own magic.

* Madame Trilby's magic flute (no relation to [[WesternAnimation/TheSmurfsAndTheMagicFlute the other magic flute]]) that Gargamel used on the Smurfs to make them sleepwalk in ''WesternAnimation/TheSmurfs'' episode "Sleepwalking Smurfs".

Quite often, however, the enchantment lasts only as long as the song does... but depending on the particulars, it may do anything from simply putting everyone who hears it into a paralytic trance, to inflicting a specific, overpowering compulsion (such as homicidal rage or suicidal despair) to putting them under full and permanent MoreThanMindControl.

* The second season of ''{{Kuroshitsuji}}'' featured an Armonica (also known as a Glass Harmonica or a Hydrocrystalophone) being used to control a ballroom filled with noble guests, turning them into savage killers. Amusingly enough, it was countered by Sebastian playing a Glass Harp, also known as an Angelic Organ - an instrument that uses a similar principle.

[[folder:Film -- Animated]]
* In Disney's ''Disney/TheJungleBook'', Kaa the snake hypnotizes Mowgli, singing, "Trussst in me... jussst in me..."
[[/folder]]

* In ''Film/{{Zoolander}}'', the trigger for Derick's brainwashing to kick in and have him assassinate the Prime Minister of Malaysia was a remix of the song "Relax" by Frankie Goes To Hollywood, which they also played while brainwashing him.

[[folder:Film]]

* In Disney's ''Disney/TheJungleBook'', Kaa the snake hypnotizes Mowgli, singing, "Trussst in me... jussst in me..."

* The movie of ''Film/JosieAndThePussycats'' features a plot to build subliminal messages into the music of manufactured pop bands.

* ''MacrossPlus'' has [[AIIsACrapShoot Virtual Idol]] Sharon Apple paralyze an entire world with her hit single, 'Information High'. [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMczRJh_OeI Listening to it]], you can kinda' feel how it might work. It's strangely hypnotic, especially when combined with her lightshow.
* The original ''ReadOrDie'' OVA was centered around a group of villains trying to put together a particular, lost symphony by Mozart, which had the power to make anyone who heard it so utterly depressed that they would instantly commit suicide by whatever means was closest at hand. Dubbed 'The Suicide Symphony', for obvious reasons.
* The Parapara brothers from DragonballGT use a stereo to cause their opponents to uncontrollably mimic their dancing, leaving them open to attack.

[[folder:ComicBooks]]
* In {{Superlopez}}, a rock band allied with the mob uses this.

[[folder:{{Film}}]]
* In ''{{Zoolander}}'', the trigger for Derick's brainwashing to kick in and have him assassinate the Prime Minister of Malaysia was a remix of the song "Relax" by Frankie Goes To Hollywood, which they also played while brainwashing him.
* In the Japanese horror film SuicideCircle, it's implied a popular music group may be subliminally responsible for all the suicides.
* In Disney's [[Disney/TheJungleBook The Jungle Book]], Kaa the snake hypnotizes Mowgli, singing, "Trussst in me... jussst in me..."
* Happens in Hocus Pocus when the witches keep the adults from stopping them using the song "I Put A Spell On You".

[[folder:LiveActionTV]]
* An episode of ''GetSmart'' had Max and 99 fighting "The Groovy Guru" (played by [[FTroop Larry Storch]]), who was producing music with subliminal messages aimed to get kids to overthrow the government and authorities.

* In {{Buffy}} season 7, the First Evil brainwashes [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire reformed vampire]] Spike into killing humans again; the trigger is the folksong "Early One Morning."

[[folder:{{Literature}}]]

* ''LordOfTheRings''.

** In ''TheSilmarillion'' Lúthien Tinúviel gains control over Morgoth himself by singing to him.

[[folder:{{Music}}]]
* TheLonelyIsland's [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yvEYKRF5IA "Boombox."]] The eponymous box causes people to lose control when they hear music coming from it.

* The Pied Piper of Hameln from the classic, cautionary tale. Initially, it seems like he's limited to controlling rats, but when the town stiffs him on his bill, he reveals similar hypnotic power over children...

[[folder:TableTopGames]]
* ''DungeonsAndDragons''.

* ''CallOfCthulhu''. The spell Soul Singing requires the caster to play a bone whistle. It allows the caster to control the target's mind, leading them in a trance-like state to their doom.
* ''{{Champions}}'' supplement ''C.L.O.W.N.'' has two of these.

[[folder:{{Theater}}]]
* PhantomOfTheOpera hypnotises Christina in the [[DarkReprise reprise]] of angel of music.

[[folder:VideoGames]]
* ''AdventureQuestWorlds'' has Discordia, the Sixth Lord of Chaos from the Mythsong saga, whose music has the power to control people. [[spoiler:It turns out that he himself is being controlled by Kimberly of One Eyed Doll, the true Chaos Lord]].

* How the tikis mind control the animals in DonkeyKongCountryReturns. The Kongs are unaffected.
* In MetalGearSolid, Psycho Mantis accidentally discovers this while whistling during TheLastDaysOfFoxhound. He manages then to use this same song in order to manipulate an ENTIRE ARMY so they could take over Shadow Moses.

[[folder:{{Visual Novel}}]]
* In ''ChaosHead'', the band Phantasm - or perhaps just their enigmatic lead singer, FES - can reduce a whole roomful of rowdy concertgoers to hypnotized zombies with their strange, prophetic goth-punk-rock. Or maybe [[ThroughTheEyesOfMadness you just imagined it]]...

[[folder:WesternAnimation]]
* There was a ''ChipAndDaleRescueRangers'' episode in which the villainess controlled a swarm of bees via ([[StylisticSuck awful]]) rock music.
* Ember [=McLain=] from DannyPhantom grows powerful when people chant her name, so she uses her teen idol status to control teenagers, who chant her name at her concert.
* The main premise of the episode "New Kids on the Blecch" of WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons. Bart joins the boy band "The Party Posse", a project by the Navy to use subliminal messages in music to get more recruits. Their first song contains the lyrics "Yvan eht nioj" ("Join the Navy" backwards).
* The movie of ''JosieAndThePussycats'' features a plot to build subliminal messages into the music of manufactured pop bands.
* In GIJoe terrorist leader [[BigBad Cobra Commander]] hires Zartan and the Dreadknocks (a group of mercenaries) to form a band called "Cold Slither" so that [[SubliminalAdvertising subliminal messages]] can be put into their recording.
* SamuraiJack has an episode called "The Rave", that has music that controls teenagers and causes them to be destructive.
* One {{Animaniacs}} Pinky & the Brain short featured Brain developing a mind-control scheme using subliminal messages played through generic country music songs.
* Used by Dr. Wily in WesternAnimation/MegaMan
* Happens a couple times in PhineasAndFerb
* In {{Detentionaire}}, there is a song that puts most people into a highly suggestable state. Some people are naturally immune to the effects, though.
* An episode of {{Garfield And Friends}} involved a Tyrannosaurus Rex who plotted to enslave mankind by getting his own TV show and hypnotizing everyone who watched his show (even Jon and Odie) by singing a song about how "Good is better than bad". Garfield is the only one who wasn't affected because he thought that the TV show was childish, until he discovered the T-Rex's true intentions.
* The {{Adventures Of The Gummi Bears}} episode "Music Hath Charms" had Duke Igthorn use a set of magical bagpipes to hypnotize anyone who heard its music (with the exception of the ogres}, especially the Gummis.

[[[folder:{{Literature}}]]

[[[folder:TableTopGames]]