In Philip K. Dick ’s book Do Android ’s Dream of Electric Sheep ? ( a.k.a . Blade Runner ) , the lead character Rick Deckard and his married woman alter their genial land with equipment send for Mood Organs . Rising in the morning , Deckard dials in a “ businesslike professional attitude , ” while his vengeful wife selects no few than six 60 minutes of “ self - accusatory slump . ”
If it is not yet absolved , the book postulate that the Mood Organ is bad – a way to feel without meaning . Imagine , then , someone reading about the Mood Organ and deciding it was a bad idea only because it had been ill executed .
EnterBrain Shift Radio , an app built in part by Jeff Strong , a percussionist who spent more than a ten studying ethno - musicology and therapeutic beat . The ensue web app , which is free for straight-out use in this beta phase , harnesses “ Rhythmic Entertainment Intervention ” to let people “ shift their brain ” from one state to another . The drug user make unsubdivided postulation about how they ’d like their mood to shift , and the organization churns through enquiry and data , ptyalize out an answer in the course of loop instrumentals propose to affect the brain in the specified way .
Say it ’s just before lunch at your New York position , and you need an energy boost . You could choose “ I ’m tired and feeling mentally groggy , ” and listen to a delightful ditty called “ Metal Element ” which “ induce the lung and large bowel meridians of the Chinese medical system . ” You could also walk down to the corner shop class or else , to purchase “ Essence of Dragon Spine ” from the military personnel selling picket from a mesa .
The difference : Brain Shift Radio works . Sort of .
Music has been used therapeutically since well before medicine apps gripped us . For all its silliness ( see this excerpt from the app ’s End User Agreement : “ Brain Shift Radio assumes no province whatsoever for contrary chemical reaction such as anxiousness or aggression that may result from a substance abuser who plays BSR tracks at a book that is too gamy ” ) , it seems that Brain Shift Radio premix can achieve their desired effect .
There ’s always an element of self - doubt : “ Am I feeling it ? I think I ’m feeling it . Is it act upon ? ” But without the requisite decennary of reservation needed to take exception the ethno - musicological research power Brain Shift , we ’ll take Strong ’s Son that BSR has harnessed music ’s do it mightiness to spay mode . for sure , the web site ’s interface and demonstration are impeccable . Ambient and rhythmic tracks can be remixed and swapped to the auditor ’s pleasure ; the community is active in building mix ; and the music rain buckets at a mellow - quality , through an elegantly simple role player .
Our immanent experience of the service is a positive , if teasing , one .
Even at its secure , Brain Shift Radio is only a more charitable Mood Organ . The euphony is purely medicinal – a mean value to an terminal , an entity as utilitarian as a pill . There ’s nothing personal or transcendent about any of these rail . You will never hear anyone say , “ I love that one birdcall ‘ For Insomniacs , ' ” or “ The ‘ single Udu membranophone to help the most unmanageable to get to slumber people ’ is really captivating . ”
The website claims the great unwashed listen to euphony prescriptively all the time , and that it ’s just streamline the process . But there ’s a big dispute between most the great unwashed ’s conception of medicine and mood and BSR ’s . Listening to Bob Dylan’sBlood on the Tracksafter a break - up is Earth apart from spin “ Single Gonga # 4 – upthrust ” from “ I experience numb and empty ” on Brain Shift Radio ( not to be confused with the euphony of Evanescence ) .
A pulse is not a tab , and the music lover ’s mind is not a gearshift . The About sectionby BSR co - founder Beth Kaplan Strong feverishly exclaims , “ reckon the child who now fall asleep easily because Mom turned on his sleep track . Or the hordes of us who can keep down our anxiousness by playing a custom calm track . ”
Ultimately , a kid postulate his mother to sing his best-loved berceuse is more or less less sinister than his requesting a “ sleep track , ” and there ’s something dystopic in the image of horde of multitude relaxing in sync to the same beat . Does Big Brother know about this technology yet ? Admirable though the research and execution of Brain Shift Radio may be , the next time it ’s 6 am and I ’m hung over , I think I ’ll skip over the “ I ’m really wasted and physically uncomfortable ” commixture and mind to “ Tequila Sunrise , ” rather .
As always , your gas mileage may vary .
Evolver.fm maintain , path and analyzes the euphony apps vista , with the belief that it ’s crucial to how humans experience music , and how that experience is evolve .
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