I’d love to say I’m an acoustic genius, but I figured out it was a standing wave because every time I went to look at the turntable to figure out what was going on, the sound would rapidly fade (and my heart would start beating way too fast, which I figured out was relevant later).
A very Heisenberg’s cat situation. I’d look and the sound would go away.
Eventually it dawned on me that my body was breaking up the wave. Did a little trial and error and then tests to confirm.
The weird heart rate is a classic symptom of intense subsonics, which I knew from working in a haunted house when I was a teenager.