I came across these three three interesting “audio illusions” that play tricks on your ears at Mighty Optical Illustions. They really are cool audio tricks, but I still want to see a YouTube clip of Mariah opening a garage door with her voice. That’s an audio trick!

MP3: Shepard’s Ascending Tones
This is a recording of Shepard’s paradox synthesized by Jean-Claude Risset. Pairs of chords sound as if they are advancing up the scale, but in fact the starting pair of chords is the same as the finishing pair. If you loop this sample seamlessly then it should be impossible to tell where the sample begins and ends.

MP3: Falling Bells
This is a recording of a paradox where bells sound as if they are falling through space. As they fall their pitch seems to be getting lower, but in fact the pitch gets higher. If you loop this sample you will clearly see the pitch jump back down when the sample repeats. This reveals that the start pitch is obviously much lower than the finishing pitch.

MP3: Quickening Beat
This recording is subtle. A drum beat sounds as if it is quickening in tempo, but the starting tempo is the same as this finishing tempo.

Ever wondered what Tenacious D might’ve been like with Wes Anderson’s sensibilities and charming accents? Well, HBO is giving us the chance to find out with its new series, “Flight of the Conchords”. “Conchords” is about “New Zealand’s fourth most popular folk-parody duo” of Jemaine Clement & Bret McKenzie and their attempts to break into the New York music and dating scene. HBO is offering the pilot episode online for free before it premieres and I found the episode to be much more funny and entertaining than it initially sounds.

“Flight of the Conchords” premieres after (already awesome) “Entourage” on HBO June 17 at 10:30.

Formed in 2002, The Mae Shi are an LA-based experimental pop/rock band from California. Terrorbird, their 59-minute-long debut EP, was a hyper ADD-afflicted hip-hop concept album about monsters and the Old Testament. Having already released four albums and other interesting “projects” (like a documentary and a 2004 mix tape that collected their favorite 1200 songs in under 80 minutes), The Mae Shi are getting ready to release a fifth(!) album that is certain to be crammed full of their trademark “busted electronics, spazzier-than-fuck drums, crazy-ass boogie guitar, distorted caveman bass and throat-destroying vocals”. Details about their new album are still unclear as there is no official release date or title (it may be called either 7XX7 or PWND). However, the released track “Run To Your Grave” is unbelievably catchy and makes The Mae Shi a definite band to watch.

MP3: The Mae Shi - “Run To Your Grave”

Not sure why I am just now hearing about this, but it seems MTV has cleared all of those back-to-back Road Rules/Real World episodes from its schedule and are allowing the very funny guys from Human Giant to host MTV (and MTV2) LIVE for 24 Hours Straight starting today! Their show is really funny and it looks like they’ve got some great guests lined up for their 24-hour gig. I just saw Albert Hammond Jr. perform and it looks like they’ve also got Ted Leo, The National, Tapes ‘n Tapes, and lots of other rad musicians.

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Although I personally didn’t think “Spider-Man 3″ improved on the previous two films, it looks and sounds like Spidey did make some strides in the soundtrack department. While the first Web-Slinger film unleashed that inescapable (believe me, I tried) Nickleback song in 2002, the soundtrack to the latest flick is packed with some surprising goodness.

In particular, I have been digging the new Rogue Wave track, “Sightlines”. It’s the kind of shimmering pop that deserves to echo through many summer night mixtapes. When coupled with “Eyes” (from their Publish My Love EP) it shows that when this band creates a vision-themed song, it’s almost guaranteed to be lovely and halcyon.

MP3: Rogue Wave - Sightlines
MP3: Rogue Wave - Eyes