We are biologically wired to sound. Sounds go directly to our amygdala, which, along with the rest of our limbic system, generates sensations of fear and anxiety—or, contrarily, joy and ecstasy. Steve Goodman writes in his book Sonic Warfare (2012) that “sound has a seductive power to caress the skin, to immerse, to soothe, beckon, and heal, to modulate brain waves and massage the release of certain hormones within the body.” This was clear to me as I watched mass anti-government demonstrations in Tbilisi’s streets following the announcement of Georgian Dream, the ruling party, in November 2024, that Georgia was suspending negotiations to join the European Union. I turned off the sound. Watching the protests in silence was a different experience, like watching soccer without the roars and chants that bring the game to such an emotional pitch.  

The impact of sound is not unique to protest—it is also critical to its suppression. The Special Tasks Department in Georgia, with its black-uniformed, masked, and baton-bearing foot soldiers, is an expert in manipulating sound to move bodies and scatter protestors. Georgia’s “robocops” have in the past used sonic technologies such as Long-Range Acoustic Devices (LRADs) and sound cannons to nauseate and repulse crowds. Protestors respond with guerrilla tactics, using makeshift noise technologies of their own—pots and pans, fireworks, the growl of motorbikes weaving among demonstrators like cavalry, or the persistent honking of cars. The 2025–26 protests in Tbilisi are above all else an audible war. They can be heard beyond the crowded streets; they reach surrounding apartment blocks and are carried by the media into people’s living rooms.

The sounds of protestors and police clashing on Tbilisi’s streets are a cacophony, confusing, disturbing, and threatening. The noise is pervasive; it is hard for an outsider to untangle the sounds of flash-bang grenades and the popping of pepper ball guns from the screaming fireworks and drum beating of the protestors. But participants quickly learn the difference, in part because the sounds represent distinct worlds in terms of the level and sophistication of the weapons used and the message conveyed. Both the state and the protestors manufacture sounds—the government’s goal is to disperse bodies on the street by using sirens and flash grenades. The message is coercive. The demonstrators use low-resource sounds—whistles, chants, and megaphones—to challenge the notion of an invincible state power. The message is resistance.   

The difference between the two sides resembles the distinction Evgenyi Zamyatin draws in his dystopian novel, We (1924). D-503, the narrator of the story, compares the “rational mechanics” of contemporary music, approved by the Guardians of the One State, with the “wild, convulsive, colorful” sounds of an anarchic past. During the nightly protests on Tbilisi’s streets, the sounds of authority come from the One State: machine technology (rational mechanics) serves obedience and order. Uniformed police and the testudo—the ancient Roman tactic of interlocked shields—reinforce the image of a unified state. The protestors, on the other hand, combine the voices of the people—chanting, singing, clapping—with folk songs, traditional dance, and sacred hymns—all vocal representations of the past.

I witnessed two examples in April 2025. First, a group of protestors singing Chakrulo. This is an ancient polyphonic song about resistance. The last verse begins “mteri damchagre ar vstiri” (Enemy, oppress me, I won’t cry). The second incident I saw was later on video. It showed hundreds of young demonstrators dancing the (Gurian) Perkhuli, a traditional dance in which men and women join hands and move in circles, accompanied by rhythmic drumming. In the context of the Tbilisi protests, both expressed civil resistance, embodied in sound and movement. Chakrulo exemplifies solidarity and defiance, while the Perkhuli, in the hands of demonstrators, represents joy, equality, and participation.

Crucially, these actions of resistance are non-violent; the focus is on large crowds and urban streets; the center is the square in front of Georgia’s parliament, a space for defiant performance against a watchful state (the police are regularly stationed in front of the building). The noise of protest is amplified by buildings on either side of the square. Protest includes the banging of stones against a metal wall, creating a “percussive siege” like the trumpets which brought down the walls of Jerico. Drumming, vuvuzela horns, and whistles not only impede police communications but create an atmosphere of rebelliousness and alarm. Protest songs have multiplied; many are rap and accessible to demonstrators on their phones. Samshoblo (Homeland), with its staccato-like rap interspersed with a melodic chorus addressing the Georgian motherland, was sung ubiquitously by young protestors in early 2025.  It became the unofficial anthem of resistance to Georgian Dream. There are also call and response slogans (lelo, lelo, Sakartvelo),^[i] along with loud recordings of Tavisupleba (Liberty), Georgia’s national anthem, and Beethoven’s Ode to Joy, the European Union’s anthem, blasted across the squares and streets of the city.

Sounds of protest resonate across the world; they are universal and borrow from one another. But they are culturally distinct. In Japan, the noise of protest frequently comes from the back of a van blaring music; in Latin America and Quebec, it is the Cacerolazo, the banging of pots and pans. In Georgia (as in Lithuania), it is a song, representing popular power, shared emotional connections, and national pride. The colorful theatricality of Tbilisi’s protests connects to a unique bardic culture still venerated by Georgians today. The sound of protest in Tbilisi in 2025, whether rap, folk, or rock, echoes the ashughs, the nineteenth-century bards who, like the medieval Provencal troubadours, performed in streets and bazaars. They sang ballads, accompanied by native instruments like the zurna and the duduki. Their poetic form—the mukhambazi—focused on music, celebration, humor, and satire. Like today’s protestors, the ashughs incorporated the lives and sounds of the street into their performance.

But over time, the sounds of protest in Tbilisi have evolved, and the colorful spontaneity of the ashugh tradition has been browbeaten by government intimidation. In 2025, the government introduced legislative amendments (without any parliamentary debate) to expand the category of offenses related to street protests. Some of these were aimed specifically at silencing the sounds of the rebellious street. “Verbal insults” or “offensive remarks” directed at public officials or collective chanting using megaphones were interpreted by government bodies as a “disturbance of the peace,” punishable by disproportionate fines and imprisonment. New regulations authorized the police to dismantle sound systems if they were deemed a “threat to public order.”  This has led to smaller crowds, fewer marches, chants, and songs in 2026.

Democracy is a practice—a method for restraining power. It has certain rules and laws; it requires a public space where voices compete, collaborate, and are exposed.  It is a system that promotes the voices of ordinary citizens. It expresses itself through speech, argument, and protest. In 2025, the sounds of democracy reverberated on Georgian streets—noisy, messy, loud, and demanding. They were the everyday sounds of a living crowd motivated to action by a government that no longer spoke for the public. In 2026, the sounds of street protest may have diminished, but a quieter city is no indication of an obedient city. Many governments have learned this lesson: silence is not the same as order or peace.