Do you remember the first time you experienced 4D Cinema? I certainly do. I vividly remember watching Shrek 4D at Movieworld and it being the most visceral experience of my young life. I remember water hitting my face when Donkey let off a thunderous sneeze, I remember the feeling of mice crawling up my legs as air blasters shot up my legs. Well, it’s the good year 2019 and now we can experience a similar sensation whilst listening to music in our own home with 8D audio.

8D Audio is a complete sonic overload. It’s like ASMR but instead of listening to people crunch on gherkins you can listen to Travis Scott’s ‘Sicko Mode’. It’s trippy, somewhat unnecessary and completely addictive.

Watch: Sicko Mode – Travis Scott (8D Audio)

I could try and explain the science behind it but quite frankly I’m dumbfounded. Maybe because my only venture into the science world is the occasional episode of Bill Nye. From what I’ve gathered 8D isn’t actually 8 dimensions, it’s 3 dimensions, but like, who’s impressed with 3D these days? Spy Kids 3 came out fifteen years ago. We’ve moved on.

8D audio implies that sound is being made from eight different dimensions. If you listen to an 8D track with headphones in it literally feels like music is bouncing from the ceiling, to the floor, to the back of your skull, to the front of your eyeballs. It’s overwhelming. It feels like one of those stupidly bouncy balls you pick up at an arcade after winning 800 tickets on the hoop-shooting game bounced in a very small box.

If you’re interested in learning about the science behind it all, check out this article. It breaks it down into neat little audio explanations and uses terms like “7.1 channel”. Something I’m not ever going to be able to wrap my head around.

There is a bounty of 8D tracks on Youtube and Spotify for your listening pleasure. Whether or not this is the future of music listening is debatable. But I’ll be damned if it’s not a great way to fall into a Youtube rabbit hole and distract yourself from all responsibilities for half an hour. Check out some of our favourite 8D tracks below. Make sure you have headphones on.

Watch: Halsey – Without Me (8D Audio)

Watch: Childish Gambino – This Is America (8D Audio)

Watch: Queen – Bohemian Rhapsody (8D Audio)