sonic wall

“You’re making songs for playlists, you’re making songs for a very narrow sonic wall. You’re not making the sort of incredible musical risks that Bowie might have taken decades ago,” he said.

Young’s “Ohio” is beautifully handled by Waldon’s collection of accomplished musicians, but her vocals have trouble breaking through the sonic wall and come off as an afterthought.

Accordingly, Mr. Armstrong’s songs — orchestrated with care by Tom Kitt — mimic the singalong choruses and hip-shaking rhythms of early Beatles hits, the ones you may hear in your head through a sonic wall of screaming teenage girls.

“There is so much music on the street, it was terrific for the film — I could use it to link the cutaways,” he commented while walking through a sonic wall of salsa music blasting from a shop doorway.

The next night, behind the rookie left-hander Hyun Jin Ryu, the Dodgers neutralized Matt Harvey, a contender for the National League Cy Young Award, spurring at various moments a deafening sonic wall inside the ballpark as they secured their seventh straight victory.