"Hallucinogen" - 08/10/2007

"Hallucinogen"
08/10/2007 

(Holy Shit. ...I just had one of the freakiest experiences ever. Fighting a cold, I had some DayQuil and a multi-vitamin, before bed, and this was probably my clearest experience of waking-world audio slipping into a dream, that I can remember. I have this 2-part ambient breakbeat music set, called Jason Dunne - Mind the Scape, that I had let loop, overnight, because there are some very chilled-out songs on the sets. Now, I have listened to different parts of this set - numerous times - but it seemed, until now, that I've only caught it in various places (usually, either starting it at a certain song I like, near the middle of the set, or waking up later in the night, still somewhere in the middle of the set), and I never actually heard the intro to the 2nd part of the set. Because of what just happened, I will probably never play this set again, when going to sleep! (Well, I don't know about that, really. It's still a dope set... Lol. But, anyway...)

To summarize the beginning of the music set: The music begins really dark and haunting, progressing along with a rolling echo effect, as if everything was sort of 'streaming together'. A man's voice comes on, really low, really slow, and begins to tell a story. As he's telling the story, the DJ is doing all kinds of freaky effects with his voice - bringing it high and low, with each sentence, from a normal man's voice, to a deep, ghostly voice, as he progresses through the story. Very creepy.)

So, in this dream, before I was ever conscious of the audio, I walked into what looked like a standard hotel room. There was a wide palette of blankets, spread on the floor, and my friends, T and J were both there. They said they had brought along a new sort of hallucinogen, and had made the palatte to lay on, while tripping. (By this time, I think the intro had started in the waking world - just the music - and it just hadn't seeped into the dream yet. My mind seemingly knew something was going on, though, because the dream atmosphere was about to change, drastically, in complete relation to the music.) Curious, I told them that I wanted to try it out, and we all took hits of this thick, black smoke. When it went in, I could feel it radiating through my body, on its way down. We all moved over to the palette and T flicked the light out, making the room almost completely dark, except for the light that was coming in through the window.

Laying down, and staring up at the ceiling, I could feel this smoke all through my body. It was cold - not too cold , but definitely enough for me to notice. The music (right on time) from my PC starting slipping into the dream, then, just as I felt myself going under. The world was a deep, rumbling echo, and this man's ghostly voice slowly streamed into me, from all sides. As he tells the story, the 'hallucinogen' fully kicks in and I'm caught looking at a picture on the wall. I can't remember what the original picture was, but from it, a ghostly apparition slowly phased forward, wafting out of the frame. It was the shadowy ghost of a female, the flesh of her features shredded, down to the bone, on at least 1/3 of her face.

She moved steadily toward us, appearing to actually grow larger, the closer she came. Her gaunt, skeletal mouth was moving, eyes gazing aimlessly toward us as she told this story (the audio from my PC), in the man's deep voice. [[Edit: I realized where I think my mind got the image for the ghost/woman. My screensaver is a slideshow of everything in my "Art" folder, which is also made up of a bunch of pics I get off of the Internet, as well as my own. I'd gotten up at about 1AM to use the bathroom and, when I laid(sp?) back down, I caught a glimpse of one of the "Celebrity Cyborg" pics I got off of Worth1000.com, in a contest where people used Photoshop and turned pics of celebs into cyborgs. It was this one, of Denise Richards: I distinctly remember thinking that I was going to have to do something about that image being on the slideshow, because it's not exactly the most pleasant thing to wake up to, in the middle of the night. Lo' and behold, it came back to completely own me, in this dream. Lol.]] 

In all seriousness; it was f*cking horrifying. Strangely enough, though, it was thrilling, at the same time. I was instantly filled with the sense of a virtual omnipresence, in the room. The room was big enough to where I could see nothing, off to my side, but darkness, and not only did I see this ghost in front of me, getting closer, I felt like someone I couldn't see was standing right beside me, in the shadows. We all flattened against the palette, recoiling from the ghost, and I tried to shut my eyes, but it was like everything went white, instead of black, and I could see a dark rendition of the ghost, still, from behind my eyelids, steadily coming forward and telling this chilling-sounding story. The situation grew more and more intense (as did the storytelling, and accompanying music), until, finally, the intro came to something of a climax, after which, my brain simultaneously drew the ghost backward, into the painting. The feeling of the presence left, along with it.

I opened my eyes, and the lights were on, again. T, J, and I had just finished the (short) trip, and we were completely mind-blown. We were staring at each other like "Oh...my....God......WTF.." and breathing hard, with these crazy, almost masochistic grins on our faces. It was like riding-out a bad trip and just....loving every minute of it. ...Very weird feeling. T looked over and, as if giving me a pop-quiz, asked "Greg, what story was that??" smiling as if he already knew the answer, and just wanted to test me. I thought for a while, and answered: "Uh....the Tell-Tale Heart?" They both responded: "Hell yeah! Good call!" all surprised. I was surprised as Hell, too, seeing as how I'd just pulled that answer out of my ass.

At just this time the dream slowly began fading away, and this really lighter/up-tempo sort of song was gradually coming in (the next song in the set, after the intro), filling the hotel room, from all angles. It was perfect. It felt like we'd gone through a haunted ride, or something, at a theme park, and this was the reception music after you've gone through the 7th level of Hell, finally arriving back at the lobby. Lol.

(The music carried over, into the waking world, as I woke up, lying there in my bed, breathing hard, listening to the music and realizing that everything had just been a dream. I still wasn't quite sure if the dream had ended, because the musical transition was seamless - It felt like the two worlds had merged. I checked my clock a few times and made sure I was awake, then got up to my computer. The first thing I did was confirm that what I was hearing was a part of the set I was listening to, by scanning back a bit and playing the intro again. Sure enough, it was the same thing I'd heard in my dream. Listening to it again gave me chills, and I had to stop listening to it, beginning to see thast ghostly image in my head, once more. 

I took the time to remember a sentence of the 'story,' and then I typed it into Google to see if I was right about the title. Turns out that I was wrong, and it wasn't the Tell-Tale Heart, but some spoken (not sung) lyrics to a Duran Duran song - 'Drive-By'. Haha. ...It actually seemed like it lasted a lot longer, when the ghost was telling it to us. Probably because I was scared shitless, and time seemed to stand still. ...Damn, what an experience, though.  I gotta get ready for work in about an hour, so I seriously doubt I'm going back to sleep. Heh. Also, I just realized that today is my (deceased) Dad's birthday. What a ghastly way to start it off.)