Weird reactions to AT tracks

Last night while smoking with two friends I played Acrid Avid Jam Shred. Normally I keep to pleasant sounding stuff when I'm in charge of music, but me and one of the guys I was with always mix in more unusual tracks. I didn't think much of playing it - I had just put on Omgyjya Switch7 and it went down really well.

After AAJS had finished the other guy looked at me and "what the FUCK was that?" He went on to say how he found it extremely disturbing and frightening, and how it sounded to him like music from a horror. He actually looked really shook - I was stunned because that track has always been really chill for me. I put on XMAS_EVE afterwards because I thought it would chill things out without having to move away from Aphex and he had the exact same reaction, and decided to leave as soon as it was over.

We were pretty stoned by the time it went on so maybe that affected his reaction more that I would have guessed, but still...I have no clue what parts of those tracks he would have found disturbing. I was really intrigued by that which got me thinking that this probably happens a lot with Aphex.

ha at omgjiya not getting any adverse reaction but AAJS creeping your friend out. I think it's just kind of fear of the unknown sort of thing?

Yeah AAJS is chill as shit, lol. I've seen these reactions from sober people quite often though. Keep in mind how small the domain of familiar/acceptable sounds are for most palates, though.

well you started the story off saying you were getting high. I know weed doesn't make your eyeballs melt but it can make someone get scared for no reason lol

Good thing you didn't get to Ventolin then

Always thought Acrid had a really chill feel to it as well. The weed must've had some influence.

I must admit I heard lots of people saying aphex is just scary and unsettling.

Friend of mine with synethesia had me turn off polynomial-c when we were driving and listening to it, she started freaking out immediately, the colors she was getting were really intense and since it was night-time I think it was hard for her to not focus on something else.

A combination of weed and unconventional music was surely it, but it still really surprised me to see just how freaked out he was by it. My other friend, who liked the track, said it was extremely intense.

I guess I'll just keep Acrid out of my playlists from now on.

Funny cuz I think weed makes everything sound better. Maybe that's just me. I will say that a lot of my favorite music is best listened to alone for various reasons.

Couple stories related to this....sometime back in the 90's me and a friend and his girlfriend took mushrooms and ran around a cemetary at night in the snow for while, goofing around throwing snowballs, making snow angels etc. until we saw a cop driving through and suddenly shining a spotlight on us. We ran back to his house and I put on SAWII. Granted him and his girl were in to punk rock and didn't like anything electronic as far as I knew. We proceeded to lay on the floor in his room in the dark with just candle light and listened to both cds all the way through and no one said a word except for the occasional oooo and aaahhhh or wow. I remember hearing nuances I'd never heard in it myself, some so subtle I wasn't sure if I was imagining it or if it was actually in there.

The other story from around the same time was another night of tripping on acid with 3 friends. We were in a wooded area where we built a fire, I had a boombox with just ICBYD and NIN - Fixed cassettes which I played over and over pretty much the entire night as we frolicked around the woods. Again none of the people there listened to anything remotely like this stuff and they loved it and wanted to know what it was. One of the guys who was skateboarder/punk went on to buy ICBYD, which was the only electronic music cd in his collection. One thing I remember is the opening of acrid avid jam shred, that high and steady tone that starts off just centers your mind and focuses it in like a laser when in that state and then proceeds to take you into a world. Also the more abrasive tracks sound insanely good in that state.

went really bad on truffels once when i put on the hab album (wich i heard already a million times)

was doing fine before it but as soon as i put the disk in and children talking started i heard hidden stuff in there i never noticed before, the music was just too huge and devilish for me to handle, turned it of after hangable auto bulb wich also frightened the living shit out of me.

after that i played the whole geogaddi album by boc, i was in fear with that one also the whole time lol, my mates didn't seem to have a problem.

i had listened a lot to autechre or drukqs on shrooms before that but never got as scared like then, man those first 2 hab tracks are friggin sick!!

who is AT

  On 5/13/2016 at 6:02 AM, usagi said:

who is AT

@

  On 5/13/2016 at 6:02 AM, usagi said:

who is AT

  On 5/13/2016 at 5:39 AM, Ivan Ooze said:

went really bad on truffels once when i put on the hab album (wich i heard already a million times)

was doing fine before it but as soon as i put the disk in and children talking started i heard hidden stuff in there i never noticed before, the music was just too huge and devilish for me to handle, turned it of after hangable auto bulb wich also frightened the living shit out of me.

after that i played the whole geogaddi album by boc, i was in fear with that one also the whole time lol, my mates didn't seem to have a problem.

i had listened a lot to autechre or drukqs on shrooms before that but never got as scared like then, man those first 2 hab tracks are friggin sick!!

On 150ug acid I was laying in bed in the dark and started to get a bit scared seeing black water snakes come out of the creases of my bed at me, thought "Hey I need to put on some music to lighten the mood" so what do I do, I put on drukqs because who knows. I get to either gwely mermans or maybe just klapbung misshk but either way it was too late. Went into the worst trip of my life after that. Horrible thought I died. Don't remember the timeline after that. Fuck drukqs held onto that pillow for dear life

at = Aww Techer

icbyd is kind of unsettling as a whole. I never thought of it as a relaxing album except maybe for Moo Kid and Alberto Balsalm to a degree. It's cavernous and medieval sounding, thrown off balance by skipping distorted rhythms. I really hated it when I first heard it, it sounded so laissez-faire. But I couldn't stop listening to it because it was so off putting. I really like it now though.

AAJS is my favourite Aphex track.

  On 5/13/2016 at 9:13 AM, Mesh Gear Fox said:

SAW first disc is pretty scary, second disk is a good one to reach for though, it's such a great listen.

 

 

I can't imagine the second to last track on the second disk as being pleasant on drugss. It's like... mocking you in some unsettling way

SAW I is pretty much the all round safest choice.

Haha how can you be scared by Acrid Avid Jam Shred??even high? Its so laid down and relaxed!

I can understand being scared by something like Death Fuck,a Drukqs drill track but AAJS??haha what the hell!

Say I wanted to intentionally freak a smoking group out some time, for the laugh. What would be the most unsettling Aphex track to play? Tree, Little Lord Faulteroy, Curtains and XMD5A would work anyway.

^ shroomdot

  On 5/14/2016 at 4:46 PM, Caribou said:

Say I wanted to intentionally freak a smoking group out some time, for the laugh. What would be the most unsettling Aphex track to play? Tree, Little Lord Faulteroy, Curtains and XMD5A would work anyway.

gwely mernans, gwarek2

I've heard of people who haven't heard ambient before losing their shit over ambient tracks when high. Good ambient can be very intense and overwhelming when you're high and if you haven't heard it before you'll start thinking what the fuck's going on.

So, I'd go for SAW2.

Haha, this thread is a funny read!

I was tripping on mushies with a good friend of mine once and he puts on, of all tracks, Goon Gumpas. Tells me that he imagines an evil santa delivering presents from his sled in the sky, slamming gifts over the side of the sleigh and scaring the shit out of everyone below. Feels like the song lasts for an hour and the whole time we look at each other while laughing hysterically, tear flooded faces and trying to breathe, both enjoying the demented santa mind-movie. Was and still is one of my least liked aphex tracks but I always think of the evil santa and smile when I occasionally hear that track now.