So what’s happening? The easy answer is: everything. A pandemic, school shootings, the climate crisis, looming recession, the collapse of democracies and the existing world order—the response that many have to all of this is to crawl inside a safer space, to find refuge from the chaos.

Dimension on a song relates to “depth of field.” As human beings we find comfort in depth: something that sounds far away is not an immediate danger; we are programmed to relax when prey is at a distance. Close sounds can be quiet and comforting, like the whispering of sweet nothings. A sweet nothing will still communicate over thunder, as long as

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