Critical listening and altered states


Ok, this is not a question about relaxing, but about listening to evaluate how the system (or a piece of gear is sounding).

What, in your experience, are the pluses and minuses of altering your state of mind for listening? This can include anything you've used to affect your everyday state of mind, from coffee, beer, scotch, tobacco, to much stronger — and psychoactive, dissociative — additives.

What do you gain by altering your consciousness in terms of what you notice, attend to, linger on, etc?
What causes more details to emerge?
What allows you to stick with a thread or, alternately, make new connections?

Or perhaps you like to keep all those things *out* of your listening; if that's you, please say a bit about why.

hilde45

Acoustics? That absolutely makes no sense in the context of this conversation,

You are right. Acoustic wall panels had no place in a conversation about altered states and critical listening...

But if you dare to google search acoustics as science you will learn what it is... Try it.

But perhaps the only way you ever used to alter your consciousness state, listening music, was beer ?

I am not in this situation sorry. Many others are like me. Then before deciding what can be said in a thread inform yourself.

 
 

 

 

"Critical listening" as suggested by the OP  as i understood it, can be related to our evaluation of the system/room sound or can be put aside by the use of beer and pot to simply enjoy music...

This critical  passive listening can interfer and be an impediment to our enjoyment of music indeed...

But there is also an active listening, using acoustics concepts and parameters, which help us to reach musical ecstasy (with beer or without beer).

 

I dont need pot or beer to forget the limitations of my low cost system. It work optimally and i enjoy it fully as the result of my creative  acoustics experiments...

Time to time i had used THC to increase my subjective experience of music, but this had no relation to my system sound. I used it 2 or 3 times a year listening Bach, Liszt,Bruckner and Philip Glass opera. the last time.

 
 

 

 

@mahgister ....sounds like my ’reality’, whatever it is...not much on candles ’n such.....*G*

Buy a salt lamp for the color orange,it increase our perception of music by associating a light climax between day and light and make music "colors"  best seen this way for me..  it is perhaps only self conditioning hypnosis...

Also i observed an effect on sound when near my gear but it is also perhaps only an aspect of my "tin foil hat" personality..

smiley

"There’s life in that old post yet..." 👍😎🎶

So funny! LOL! And thanks for keeping it short and to a single post! Brevity is the soul of wit and wisdom, avsjerry!