The story behind one of my favorite recordings
I recorded “Summer Thunderstorm 3D” with tiny microphones in my ears, capturing 45 minutes of rain and thunder. On headphones, you can hear the storm as I heard it. This is the story behind that recording, and how staying still in the rain became a meditation practice of its own.
Last summer, the little lake in my town dried out completely. That had never happened before.
We’d had weeks of heat and drought. When the weather began to change, it only got harder to bear. The air grew heavy and humid, the kind that makes you expect a storm at any moment. It kept us waiting for three more days.
When the first drops of rain finally fell, I grabbed my in-ear microphones, found a spot and pressed record.
The rain cooled the air and washed the dust out of it. I stood there breathing it in, clean and fresh, while the earth soaked up the water around me. After weeks of heat and three days of that heavy humidity, I could feel the relief through my whole body. I still get goosebumps listening back.
That recording became Summer Thunderstorm 3D. It starts gently, builds into the full storm, then slowly settles again.
You’ll find it under Journeys > Ambience in the app. ▶ Listen now ↗
Why thunder rolls
The rain brought the relief, but the thunder is my favorite part. The lightning stretched across huge sections of the sky, and some of those rumbles last close to a minute. Put on headphones, and it feels like you’re standing right there beneath it.
A lightning bolt can be miles long. You see it light up in an instant, but the sound takes its time. Thunder from the nearest parts reaches you first; sound from the more distant stretches arrives seconds later. That’s why thunder rolls instead of giving you one short bang.
Distance changes the sound, too. The sharper, higher sounds fade more quickly on the way, leaving the low rumble to travel farther and last longer.
Someone two villages over can watch the same flash and hear a completely different roll of thunder. The distances change, so the sounds arrive in a different order. The same lightning will sound completely different, depending on where you are.
Borrowing the Conductor’s ears
The in-ear microphones look like little earbuds working in reverse. They sit at the entrance to my ear canals, catching the sound after my head and outer ears have already shaped it. That’s what gives this recording its 3D effect.
A sound to your left reaches your left ear a tiny bit sooner, and louder, than your right. Your head gets in the way of the far ear. Your brain reads those differences to work out left and right.
For above and below, front and back, your brain uses the folds of your outer ears. Some sound travels straight into the ear canal. Some bounces off those folds and takes a tiny detour, arriving a little later. Those delays change how the direct and reflected sound combine. The pattern depends on the direction, and your brain has learned to read it. Echoes add clues about distance and the space around you.
You can see how much the ear shape matters in this short experiment. Cover the folds, and the person can still hear and tell roughly left from right. Pinpointing the sound in 3D becomes much harder.
With the microphones sitting right there, those outer-ear reflections become part of the recording. Play it back on headphones and the stereo recording becomes true 3D and will feel as though it’s all around you. You’re borrowing my ears for a while.
Headphones do matter here. Speakers send both channels to both ears and add your own outer-ear reflections on top of mine. That kills the 3D effect.
The problem with being the microphone
If I turn my head, the whole recorded perspective turns with it. Even a swallow or a louder breath will make it onto the track. So I have to do my best to stay still while my nose itches and my right leg falls asleep. For 45 minutes.
I have ADHD. This is not my natural habitat.
But it has become a meditation practice of its own. I notice the itch, resist the urge to scratch, and keep listening. Often it passes. If you’ve spent time with Mindgasm, you’ll recognize that small moment of choosing not to react.
Halfway through, the rain became a proper downpour. I got soaked, the mics got wet, and I had to retreat indoors. I finished the recording on all fours on the bed beside the window, with my head halfway outside.
In case you pictured a comfortable studio setup. 😉
Somewhere else for a while
This recording was the seed of the Ambience section. Sometimes I don’t want music or a voice guiding me. I just want to listen.
Put it on for meditation, wind down with it before sleep, or let the rain drown out the neighbor’s lawn mower for a bit. On a hot night, it might be exactly the sound you’ve been missing.
Windy Night 3D is there too, recorded during an autumn wind and rain front. A forest atmosphere is in the works, and I have some creek recordings waiting their turn. More will follow, though planes, traffic and wind keep most takes out of the app.
For now, put on your headphones and enjoy the storm.
You get to stay dry.
- The Conductor -
You’ll find it under Journeys > Ambience in the app. ▶ Listen now ↗