Auditory affects on psychedelics

[perpetualdawn]

Can we talk about "aurals" aka audio hallucinations/affects?

BTW: I'm not talking about oral or auras I'm talking the weird SOUND shit that happens on psychedelics.

We spend a lot of time talking about visuals on psychedelics, but we don't talk much about aurals. Personally, I am a big fan of these, I guess I'm very much a sound oriented person. I find aurals to be analogous to visuals, both in terms of their types, and their characteristics. I've noticed strong aurals on LSD, mushrooms and DPT, and probably other psychedelics as well, but my suspicion is that they happen on any trippy psychedelic that is said to cause visuals.

One of my favourite types of "aural" is very similar to CEVs. It's when you chill in complete silence and darkness and listen. I find my mind picks up on the background signal noise of my aural system, and I start getting feedback from that. What I hear starts out with what I think is the baseline ringing of each one of my cillia in my ears, all singing at the same time, every frequency at once. On psychedelics, it becomes much different, because the aural perception apparatus is heightened, so you start getting mental feedback, and heightened pattern recognition etc. The sound begins to respond to where your attention lies. As you listen to a certain frequency, it begins to stand out and change, as if nudged by your own attention, and then as your attention chases this sound, it further nudges the sound, which is feeding back on itself, and creating bizzare flanging, phasing, delay type stuff. These sounds can really build up on themselves in a very fractal kind of way that is a bit hard to explain, but eventually it can get to be too much to focus on, and it all collapses, and then it's back to that baseline ringing.. and so on.

My pet theory is that the aural system in the brain, being a sensory processing system, uses a lot of similar neurotransmitters and neural structures to the visual system. I suspect that the PDs effect these stuctures in similar ways, rendering analogous perceptual affects. This is only backed up by my own subjective observations, I've read a bit about neuroanatomy, psychology and what lies between, but wouldn't call myself an expert by any means. I imagine there are things like edge detection "algorithms" in the brain that have feedback paths built in, so that when we crank up the firing rate of the neurons in these systems, you start getting feedback... rendering "edges" out of nowhere, stuff like that.

There's also the phenomenon of hearing completely invented music out of nowhere, and the auditory equivalents of OEVs, like the way music can be radically exaggerated, or noticing subtle phasing effects from tight echoes against solid surfaces, things like that.

TL;DR: Aural hallucinations are fascinating, please share your thoughts, insights and anecdotes!

 

[Xorkoth]

I will comment on this more later, but I just wanted to say that I hear invented music sometimes anyway, regardless of psychedelics (well it's always in my head, but I actually hear it sometimes too). When I was a teenager, before I ever did any drugs or thought about doing them, whenever I would mow the lawn the loud droning would turn into totally audible church-style music, but super badass church music, like amazing organ music with many layers.

Have you ever tried DiPT? You would probably totally love it. No psychedelic even comes close to touching the aural distortions of DiPT. Listening to nature or silence or background noise on DiPT is an incredible experience, much more intense than listening to music on it.

 

[perpetualdawn]

I get invented music when sober sometimes too. Clear as day, typically it happens right when I'm waking up. It's pretty amazing that the mind can create music like that, out of nowhere.

I've not tried DiPT, I'm very curious about it, but honestly a little scared too. The reports of musical dissonance terrify me! Music is always something that I can rely on in a trip, and I can imagine myself loosing my bearings to have it all twisted and out of key. It would probably be fine, I never get scared or freak out on trips, even with big-ish doses of DPT, which lots of people report as terrifying. From the reports I've read on DiPT, it sounds like one of the effects is something like a re-mapping of your cillia to frequency perception, kind of like what a cochlear implant does. But since I don't have a cochlear implant, and have never tried DiPT, that's just conjecture.

Looking forward to your further comments Xorkoth (and others)

 

[.:Holy::Toast:.]

Ketamine and dmt cab give me invented music a lot although it doesn't happen sober.
On 2c-e I often get a strange drilling sound when it's really quiet, very strange but not terribly distressing since I'm so used to it

 

[Xorkoth]

Yeah 2C-E produces some of the largest amount of and most intense aural distortions of any substance I've tried. On a high dose it almost seems as if sound waves become distorted as they travel a greater distance. Like if I stand right next to the TV for example, I can hear it fine, but if I stand across the room the sounds get all garbled and distorted. Also I get a somewhat similar effect as I do on DiPT but less extreme, where in the quiet, background sounds become audible that are truly strange and otherworldly. Also if I stand outside in my backyard at night and listen to the insects and forest sounds, I can tell precisely where each is coming from, all at once. However, unlike DiPT, 2C-E augments music to a fantastic degree.

 

[perpetualdawn]

I've definitely noticed this extreme increase in sound location precision before (on all kinds of PDs). Sounds in well recorded/engineered music becomes more specifically placed in the sonic field too. I feel like I could echo-locate on acid sometimes. Surely that's just a fantasy though, never tried, but it would be fun to test out

 

[《Plasticity》]

I've never tried DIPT but foxy (5-meo-dipt) definately had some audio distortions, the tone of everything around me seemed dropped... it wasn't entirely pleasant though but I think the GI side-effects had something to do with that just like I find heavy visuals annoying when nauseous. Dissociatives, MXE in particular are good for adding a 'flanger' effect to sound. Basically makes everything sound very metallic. As for the 'invented music' I only experience this after a rave where I consumed MDxx, when I get home and turn on the sink I'll continue to hear full blown music clear as day.