Hafto's atmosphere on the False Gods record hangs in the air above everything like static after a thunderstorms—the sound of his voice has a thinness to it; it is direct and unwavering. You can nearly smell the concrete and taste ashes in your mouth.

In Ratfink!'s world, there is a particular point where the rules of the game begin to unravel. It is comparable to hearing a guitar out of tune; it is similar to the smell of spilled beer on carpet; it emits a feeling of inhaling static and concrete dust or tasting ash on one's tongue.

Consequential discovered how to hear music, along with hearing everything else that occupies space around music, like silence after song drops, negative space, the ash left behind after a fire is extinguished.

"Lust" by Sophia Mengrosso doesn't take you slowly into the "Lust" world. It hits you as if it is hot on the ground like concrete.

The quietness that inhabits Gugga Lísa's singing embodies a type of acoustic resonance that resonates beyond something that is simply stillness.

As the deep bass settles into your chest halfway through "Low Key" everything fades away into thin air with the exception of your breath and intention. The beer foam is held back by the rim of the night; the static buzz is between the street lights.

In the month of December, on Scotland's west coast, one experiences a certain degree of quietness compared with the previous summer months.

When "Just Like Me" begins playing, the room gets colder because of the song's emotional impact. Before you understand it, you have already felt it.

Just before the piano plays the first note of "Dead End," the air in the room drops. You can feel it in your wrists first. We've all experienced that feeling; the silence is thin, buzzing in your ears, while your mind runs through a thousand thoughts, but your body is done.

You can feel El Drifte's presence before he gets into the venue. The room shifts as soon as he enters with his coat and the outside cold comes in and after the door closes, the cold is gone and there is warmth again.

In the "before" you have hot Texas days. Days that are ordinary and stretched out in thin wispy small minutes on the clock; Days with a guitar resting on the wall in a position of authority, like some old man glaring down at you.

There is a brief moment, before all of the voices begin to settle down into your chest and all of the music starts playing, that you feel as if you're losing your breath.

You can picture a moment years from now with Amber Jade Smith at home on her couch taking notes or writing, watching TV without distraction.

Yo-Blake didn't show up with a bang; he was just another one that showed up with pressure. With Static in the Chest. With others' opinions rattling in his head like empty beer bottles hitting a concrete driveway.

Before the world turns back to the light, there is a time when it seems the only way you can breathe is if you are breathing the air that comes from a can of beer while taking a deep breath with your chest, when you remember the scent of wet concrete, and when you are reminded of how hot it is to drink something cold.

Just like many other major characters in literature, the heroine of Ava Valianti's song "Hot Mess" enters the story via an admission rather than through violence.

The songs by Chloe Hawes have always been about someone trying to make sense of all the chaos from partying hard, being out too much living in crappy places, and dealing with the mental anguish they have experienced while growing up in a dysfunctional household.

As the band walks through the door they approach the warmth and comfort of analogue tape. Initially a slow and slightly staticy buildup, but eventually there’s a sudden explosion of energy in the room.

With Not My First Emotional Rodeo, Janet Devlin widens, deepens, and complicates the texture of her voice as it has always been; soft around the edges, sharp where it counts, like beer foam drops on concrete or a spark flicks off of ash.

When ENAVE walks into a room, ENAVE comes to exist in the room. When there is static flowing under concrete it’s the same feeling. A drunken night having beer and then hearing parts of what you did not know the night actually were.