While karaoke is simply seen as an enjoyable pastime here in the United States, it is wildly popular in the Philippines. For those unaware, karaoke is the practice of singing along to the lyrics of a song with one’s own voice. This simple premise has evidently struck a chord with the residents of the southeast-Asian country. In a country with a GDP per capita of less than $4,000, compared to the United States’ more than $85,000, the Filipino karaoke industry still manages to be worth an estimated half-a-billion U.S dollars. Despite the activity’s success, karaoke seems to have also garnered a bit of a dark side over the years.
One of the most notable examples of this is the peculiar real-life phenomenon known as the “My Way Curse.” There are multiple documented instances throughout the years of karaoke singers meeting their untimely demise when Frank Sinatra’s hit song “My Way” was playing. In 2007, for instance, a security guard working at a karaoke bar fatally shot a 29-year-old man singing the song because the singer was “out of tune. A year later, in 2008, a similarly-fatal incident occurred when audience members thought one karaoke singer, a 29-year-old man named Abdul Sani Doli, was using the microphone for too long, prompting one of them to walk up to Sani Doli with a knife and stab him to death.
A possible explanation for all these correlated, seemingly spontaneous encounters is that the song is often used as a bookend to many karaoke bars’ song lists. This means that many of these altercations take place quite late at night, when customers have already had several drinks or have become noticeably more irritable due to sleep deprivation. Some also say these effects could be amplified by the triumphant mood embodied within the song, which a few onlookers may feel is not properly represented by the performer, leading to the group becoming aggravated. Homicide has also been a systemic issue for the Philippines in general, with Human Rights Watch reporting that over 332 extrajudicial killings have taken place within the country between January and November of last year alone. There are also estimates that there are over a million illegal firearms in the Philippines, only worsening matters.
Whatever the case, public superstition surrounding the piece has only continued to grow. Many karaoke bars in the Philippines have now banned “My Way” from being played entirely. One 63-year old karaoke singer from the southeast-Asian nation named Rodolfo Gregorio put it best when he said, “The trouble with My Way is that everyone knows it and everyone has an opinion. You can get killed.” What a harrowing twist to an otherwise innocent activity.
