“That is what the demise of humanity sounds like,” a Youtube user commented upon listening to the rendition of the Choral part of Beethoven’s Ninth performed by a group of 15 Pepper Robots, which the internet dubbed “the choir from Hell”.
In fact, while the original is meant to sound solemn, majestic, and uplifting, this performance is slightly tone-deaf, eerie and deeply unsettling. Admittedly, I would see it as a good fit for a scene in those dystopic movies that are audiences seem to love so much: the tributes in The Hunger Games could likely have sung it in the Arena before the bloodbath began (just listen to the lyrics, they are about the strife for improvement in society) or it could have been the jingle in broadcast programs airing in a 1984-like regime. After all, the lyrics of An die Freude deal with an ideal new order of society based on brotherhood, a message that can easily be twisted in countless sinister ways.