South Africa

[Louis VI the Fat]

Me, I think that everybody ought to see Africa at least once. Africa is in your genes. It is where the human species evolved, where we lived for millions of years. Africa speaks to you on a primal level, it resonates with your soul. All the sounds, the sights, the smells - it connects with something very deep inside of you.

This is what I mean:

Film scores mimic alarm calls of animals to heighten fear and emotion, study suggests
Film soundtracks like Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and The Birds mimic animal distress calls in the wild to heighten our emotions, a report claims.

Researchers say that the score for popular movies tap into our basic animalistic brain to evoke all kinds of feelings from sadness, to fear, to excitement. They believe that "non-linear vocal attributes", the rasping and distortion of voices used by mammals in times of duress, are used by film soundtrack composers.

This technique included the overblowing of brass and wind instruments and the metallic rasp of a French horn when a hand is placed in the bell. They also employed feedback loops from electric guitars and the crash and bang of drums and cymbals.

Professor Daniel Blumstein, the lead author at the University of California, compared a number of soundtracks from Hollywood blockbusters to the distress calls of marmots. He found that the deliberate distortion of sound and sudden pitch and harmony changes at times of dramatic tension and mimicked the alarm calls given out by the marmots at times of duress.

"Noise is associated with horror and fear," said Prof Blumstein who reported his findings in Royal Society journal Biology Letters. "Abrupt frequency shifts are associated with sad dramatic scenes. Noise is associated with horror and fear. I would say it taps into our primal fear which is shared with other mammals and birds.

"It scares us, but it also scares other animals."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/7...-suggests.html

We are animals. We are African animals. Art is finding the hardwired African instincts in us, expressing the sensations, the vruelty and beauty of the African wild.


I had such a shock of recognition in Africa. Suddenly, while there, I realised why the sounds of my electric guitar excited me. I was only mimicking the far away shrieks of danger that I had never heard in my life before, but that reside in my soul, that are hardwired in my brain to raise adreneline levels for.