172 Heatwave thunderstorm that washes and cools (panoramic, made for headphones)

Full Episode description

Have the back streets faded to silent?

Have the dogs begun to bark?

Is there anything still hanging on the line?

Get them in, there’s a storm coming.

That front room chair with the cushion that isn’t supposed to be outside but is, because it’s been so hot and dry of late, is that in?
And the pile of old shoes?
And the newly potted plants that can’t cope with heavy rain yet? 

Get them all in, the air’s gone electric.

Thunder rolls thickly across a strange coloured sky.
Brings rain that’s in such a hurry to get down that it tries to get down all at once.
Intense sound. Rivulets of sparkling water, flowing off the tarpaulin. Pouring onto the parched concrete yard.
Wafting smells of petrichor.

Heatwave storms plough a deep furrow through the sky as they pass, that can take a while to settle.
It’s the dramatically changing sound scenes that these storms create that make them so rewarding to listen to.
The sheer intensity of an unbridled deluge.
The panoramic spatial thunder created as the lightning superheats and explodes massive atmospheric volumes of air.
And the relief, after the storm has passed, expressed through the countless dripping drops of fallen water, from all the surfaces on which it fell.
Three movements. Three acts. Of a heatwave storm.

A powerful storm is like a piece of theatre.
It bends and redefines the meaning of time.
It suspends your belief in what is normal and your perspective on reality.
And when it’s over, it leaves you feeling physically different to how you were before.
Different, and better.

* The Lento mics captured this storm as it passed over Hackney in North East London in early afternoon last week, after a long period of exceptionally hot and dry weather. The location is the back garden of a small terrace house. Temperature prior to the storm was 30 degrees. Humidity was 39%. A few months ago the humidity was typically between 80% and 90%.