The residents of a town in New Zealand have been getting quite an earful of Celine Dion as participants in a local “Siren Battle” employ the high treble of the French-Canadian singer's voice to cut across the landscape in the middle of the night.
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With these offending events typically involving multiple groups of drivers gathering to blast sound the loudest and farthest with the use of emergency sirens, amplifiers, and speakers welded to vehicles, the noise from these battles has apparently gotten so loud the residents of the town of Porirua have launched a petition to bring an end to the madness.
"Celine Dion is popular because it's such a clear song - so we try to use music that has high treble, is clear and not much bass," Paul Lesoa, the founder of one of these groups in Auckland told NZ website The SpinOff. "We just love music, we love dancing, and doing this is better than night clubbing or drinking in a bar in the city, where there's fights etc," he explained.
Lesoa says he’s even applied for a permit and an official space for their events, and is still waiting to hear back. "Basically everyone has a hobby and while our hobby can be quite disturbing and we understand how disturbing it can be, we just want our own proper, safe space away from people to do it."
The Porirua City Council previously agreed to a 10PM siren battle cut-off time limited to industrial areas, but the battles have since returned to the neighborhood.
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One petition author, Wes Gaarkeuken, says taxpayers are "tired of the inaction and dismissive attitude shown by the council and the mayor concerning this issue," and has so far gathered hundreds of signatures.
Diana Paris, an avowed Celine Dion fan, signed the petition while acknowledging that although she does listen to the diva "in the comfort of [her] lounge and at [her] volume,” she absolutely did not enjoy hearing, “fragments of it stopping and starting at any time between 7PM and 2AM."
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Mayor Anita Baker explained to Radio New Zealand that she was indeed "sick to death" of the battles and wanted them to move to more secluded areas. Unfortunately, "we haven't got anywhere in our city where there's not houses that wouldn't hear anything," Baker added.