What did you do yesterday? Can you picture where you were? The faces of the people you were with?

“Of course I can,” you might be saying, “it was only yesterday. I came here for the music, not to have my memory insulted.”

If that’s what you’re saying, first of all, calm down. But also, I have news for you: approximately 3% of the people reading this, despite knowing where they were yesterday and who they were with, can’t picture those people or places.

That’s because they have a fascinating condition called aphantasia; essentially, the inability to create mental images.

It’s a condition that has only recently been identified and investigated, largely because if you’re born with it, you have no reason to think anything is wrong. It wasn’t until 2003 that a scientist named Adam Zeman came across a patient who’d undergone minor surgery and found himself suddenly unable to visualize. When that story was published in 2010, thousands of people contacted Zeman with claims that they, too, lacked the ability to see things “in their mind’s eye” but had never known they weren’t alone.

If you want to hear more about aphantasia I recommend this podcast episode. But what has stuck with me the most is that it gets at an uncomfortable truth: the experience of being alive is not standardized. We really have no idea if the way we take in the world with our senses is anything like the way another person does.

What makes this a beautiful song:

1. To me, the drums are recorded so dry, with no reverb at all, that they feel like they’re right up next to my ears. But you might not hear it that way.

2. The chord changes make me feel like I’m spinning. But you might not feel it that way.

3. The saxophone sounds purple and soft. But you might not visualize it that way.

Recommended listening activity:

Looking at your house through the wrong end of binoculars.

Buy it here.

The post Week 805: “Feels Like Yesterday” by Harrison feat. Jaleel Shaw appeared first on Beautiful Song Of The Week.