The scary sound of Aztec skull whistles

We had a group of six people using 3D-printed skull whistles for an outdoor festival&#x2F;theatre&#x2F;ritual event, emulating the sound of shrieking storm winds. It was incredibly atmospheric, and the sound carries surprisingly far!<p>Depending on how you place your lips and shape your mouth, you can get semi-white-noise sounds from soft to harsh, or you can shape the noise into something more like a scream&#x2F;shriek.<p>It&#x27;s funny seeing them turn up on HN just a month after using them in person :)

Finally, a headline that actually matches the content.<p>My initial reaction to reading the title was &quot;there better be a play button involved&quot;. Check. Reading the article this page is associated to see how&#x2F;why these sound like they do, and wondering what the first person to figure this out was like.

<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;x.com&#x2F;esrtweet&#x2F;status&#x2F;1859556171918479626" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;x.com&#x2F;esrtweet&#x2F;status&#x2F;1859556171918479626</a> (2024-11-21):<p>&gt; Evil has a sound. It&#x27;s the sound of humans screaming in agony as they die. Aztecs made implements to simulate this sound. They have been found in the hands of sacrificial victims… the Aztecs considered the ceremonial experience incomplete without the screaming, and built death whistles to simulate the proper sound of agony.

There is an &quot;Aztec Death Whistles&quot; playlist on Spotify[1] that would have been just thing for Halloween.<p>Maybe not the best Thanksgiving music, but who are we to judge?<p>[1]<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;open.spotify.com&#x2F;playlist&#x2F;1aRqJ7PFZswy4JJ1QJi0Hd?si=X3tloQ_LSPKRdFMpEMzwfg&amp;pi=DBd4Pog-Tx25y" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;open.spotify.com&#x2F;playlist&#x2F;1aRqJ7PFZswy4JJ1QJi0Hd?si=...</a>

You can 3D print it and attach it to a boiling kettle.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=Z33HIAFuKoQ" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=Z33HIAFuKoQ</a>

I&#x27;ve been meaning to try to 3d print one of these. There was a meme video about someone doing a batch of 200 to give out on Halloween, and it made me wonder if a plastic one would yield the same sounds.

Sounds on brand for people who regularly tortured children to death so that their tears would placate the gods and fertilize the Earth: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Tl%C3%A1loc" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Tl%C3%A1loc</a><p>Spicy take: Aztec society was right up there with Sparta in terms of being some of the most fucked up shit ever on this planet.