Clubbing is good for your health, according to neuroscientists
We Become One — A new documentary explores the positive effects that dance music and shared musical experiences can have on the human brain.
Can having a rager actually be good for you? It might be hard to comprehend while struggling through the Tuesday after with limited serotonin, but according to neuroscientists, hitting the club and dancing all night to music while surrounded by others can have a positive impact on our wellbeing.
The impact that dance music has on the human mind is the subject of We Become One – a new 60-minute documentary from AlphaTheta, which has been released today, April 2.
The film is led by London-born, now Berlin-based DJ Kikelomo, who speaks to neuroscientists and experts about the effects that listening to dance music can have on the human brain.
In the film, cognitive psychologist and neuroscientist Daniel Levin explains to her that dance music can help the brain reach a different state – a flow state – that can be difficult to reach in daily life.
He asks: “Why are they sending out electricity? They’re trying to spur the production and release of different chemicals. These different brain states characterise different states of consciousness.”
“There’s this thing called the flow state, and it’s characterised by focused attention, a loss of a sense of self, a loss of a sense of time, and, really, the focused attention is a special kind where you’re not really aware of yourself or what you’re doing,” he continues.
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“You’re outside yourself, and electronic music is really great at inducing it, which is why so many raves and so many parties and even therapeutic uses of music involve the repetitiveness. That repetition allows you to enter a meditative state, and you can close off the inner chatter of your brain and the inner dialogue and just be, and when you can relax into that state of here and now, that’s when the trance can come.”
It’s a sentiment echoed by Dr Julia C. Basso, neuroscientist and director of the Embodied Brain Lab, who explains that when people dance with others, it creates a feeling of unity among those sharing a dancefloor. “That whole social network of brain areas is lighting up, firing together, so there’s a lot of inter-brain synchrony that’s happening.”
Apart from scientists, We Become One also sees Kikelomo speak to longtime DJs and producers including Detroit legends Moodymann and Seth Troxler, exploring how music has the power to bring people from far-flung places and backgrounds together.
Watch We Become One via AlphaTheta and Pioneer DJ’s YouTube channel.
Zahra Onsori is a freelance journalist. Follow her on Instagram.
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