Brown noise for racing thoughts.

Why it works

Brown noise is a low, even wash with most of the brightness taken out, and many people with busy heads reach for it first. It lowers the contrast of everything else. The radiator, the street and the fridge all sink into one soft floor. Here it is generated live, so there is no loop for a restless mind to catch.

Racing thoughts are not noise, though, and cannot be masked like noise. They are a mind looking for work. The gentler fix is to hand it some: a slow account of something true and far away, with the ending told first so there is nothing to wait up for. That is the second fader.

What you are hearing

• Brown noise. White noise run through a leaky integrator, so its energy falls six decibels per octave, then low-passed at 400 Hz. A low, even wash.
• The voice. The first four minutes of Aristotle, the Greatest Philosopher, a Lullable story, in a synthesised voice. It only plays if you bring it in.
• The ending. The preview lasts four minutes. Its last ten seconds are a straight fade to silence, so it never stops abruptly.

For a real recording that runs forty minutes, the Lullable iPhone app has rain, waves, a campfire and plain noise, with no voice and no music.