The Bookshelf Equalizer

Have you ushered in the digital age with reckless abandon, leaving behind the analogue one? Have you neglected your CD's for digital music files, or your books for e-readers? Well then hang on to them either way, because they will help you improve the sound of whatever you do listen to! Plus, they look cool doing so. I bring you the world's first 'bookshelf equalizer'. With this experiment, I promise you will never look at your books and CD's the same way again!


HOW TO CREATE  YOUR VERY OWN BOOKSHELF EQUALIZER

This experiment involves arranging items on a bookshelf in very deliberate ways, to acheive unique improvements in sound quality. The method can work with CD's, books, DVD's (yes, including Blu-Ray....), video tapes, cassette tapes, and similar items. Below, you will find a number of variations, covering single-shelf layouts to more intricate multiple shelf layout patterns.

As with all experiments, you must listen to your sound before changing anything, then again after changing something, to see if you can determine any changes in sound quality.

BOOKSHELF EQUALIZER VARIATIONS:

Legend:

Parity = Whether there should be an odd or even number of items on a given shelf.
Pattern = The arrangement of the items. (n.b. If, ie., I reference "CD's", the instructions are the same as applies to books, DVD's, videotapes, etc.)
Sound = Type of sound that pattern produces
Spine =





Caveats:

* Remove all bookmarks from the pages of books, and shelf dividers. They impede the flow of energy.
* Start with all CD's (or books, etc) right side up, vertical on the shelf. This means, spine facing you (you can read the title), title reads left to right. Thus any items not rearranged, should remain in this default position.
* In all cases, its best to push the CD's/books toward the back of the shelf, unless otherwise stated in the pattern instructions. However, after I push them back, I like to pull them out just a hair, so that they don't actually touch the back of the shelf (else it creates interface tension, resulting in a slightly less desirable sound quality).

HALF-EMPTY:

Sound: Musical, tonally grounded. May have a toy-soundstage (ref. to small)
Parity: Even
Pattern: Note: In this variation, the items will be placed horizontally on the shelf. So, divide CDs on shelf in half. Turn the right half so that the spine is facing the rear (away from you). (e.g. For 7 cd's on the left, spine is facing you, the next 7, spine is facing the shelf.)


HALF-EMPTY (MULTI-SHELF):



Sound: Quite musical, fluid, well-balanced, beyond the usual criticisms.
Parity: Even
Pattern:
First shelf: Same as "Half Empty"
Second shelf (adjacent, to the right of first shelf): Same
Third shelf (below first shelf): same, but placed vertically

n.b. I consider this variation a standard of comparison. It is the best of all those listed in this article. Note, if it isn't reproduced just as shown in the photo, with 3 shelves, comprising the adjacent shelf and the one below the first shelf, then I can't speak for what sort of sound will come from a modification of this layout. Although, if you have a single piece of furniture, you should be able to achieve similarly good results from doing 3 shelves, one below the other (ie. horizontal, vertical, horizontal; or vice versa).

n.b. The CD's on the second shelf are empty jewel cases. Showing that it isn't simply informational fields in play here (although that is part of it).



THE MINIMALIST: Starting with an even number of CD's, turn the CD to the left of the middle CD around.



Sound: Will retain the original timbral colour of instruments and integrity of the sonic structure. But will not significantly increase definition-resolution-information and-or musicality, as the other variations will.
Parity: Even
Pattern: Find the middle CD, turn the CD to the immediate right of that CD, so that the spine faces the shelf. (e.g. Out of 16 CD's, turn the 9th).

THE ROMANTIC:

Sound: Does not sound right, with inverted attack and decay characteristics, making for rolled-off edges. You may not care, as its musicality is enveloping.
Parity: Odd
Pattern: Turn all CD's on the shelf so that spines face towards the shelf, then find the middle CD, and turn the one just to the right of it, so that spine faces you. (e.g. Out of 15 CD's, turn no. 8).


THE ROMANTIC, Pepe Le Pew Edition:



Sound: Similar to "The Romantic", with softer strings and a complete lack of harshness.
Parity: Odd
Pattern: Find the middle CD and turn the one just to the left of it, so that spine faces shelf. (e.g. Out of 15 CD's, turn no. 7 and 8).


INSY OUTSY:

Sound: Good resolution and balance of highs/lows, neutral tone, not the most engaging however.
Parity: Odd
Pattern: Leave the CD's on either end of the bookshelf, as is (with the spine toward you). Start from the 2nd CD, turn that one so that the spine faces the shelf. The next CD leave as is, and continue alternating so that each other CD is turned, ensuring the last CD remains with the spine facing you.


THE NATURALIST:



Sound: Neutral sort of sound.
Parity: Odd
Pattern: Same as "Insy Outsy", except the CD's that are turned, are turned so that the spine faces the ceiling (first and last CD, spine faces the ceiling).


THE WAVE (MULTI-SHELF):



Sound: You tell me and we'll both know.
Parity: Odd
Pattern: On the first shelf, all CD's are left as normal and pushed back except: first CD is pulled out to the edge of the shelf. On the second shelf, all CD's are pulled out to the edge, except the last CD is pushed in.

The MP3's of Morphic Messaging

Morphic messaging, briefly, is a means of tapping into morphic resonances (energy fields, studied by everyone from Einstein to Dr. Rupert Sheldrake). Which, in Sheldrake's meaning, implies that the past influences current activity. That there is an interconnection among activity, whether by humans or animals. From here, we go to informational fields, studying the links created in the languages that we share (both words and symbols). But it's ok if that explains little. I don't want anyone to get too hung up on the concepts. I've seen too many people do that, lead themselves down wrong paths by way of idiology (sic), and end up understanding even less about Beltism than they started with.

Morphic messaging, a term used in the science of Beltism, has in my opinion, more to do with studies in that science, than it has to do with what Sheldrake is studying. Their concepts are related, that is all. Like Sheldrake's work, Beltism is the study of particular peculiarities of Nature. So what does any of this have to do with mp3's? I'm getting to that....

A couple of years ago, I did some brief studies on the effects of morphic messaging on mp3's. They were limited to changing the name of the mp3 file, and the name of the folder that the file sits in, to words that I thought would be more conducive to "good energy", and hence, good sound. And there I discovered another "secret" that the world at large is happily oblivious to and eager to write off: not only did it improve the sound of the mp3's, but that improved sound got copied along with the file, when the file was copied (e.g. burned to disc). In fact... the copies sounded better than the originals.

More recently, I acquired this little puppy you see over on your right: the PWB Digiplus USB. It is a first for PWB Electronics, in the sense of applying the principles of Beltism to digital audio. Needless to say, it is also a first for the audio marketplace in general. In that it is a USB flash drive that purports to improve your sound. All your sound. Anywhere. Simply by plugging it into a USB jack. It does this job admirably and to great effect. Moreover, it was fun blind testing this on friends (who were not audiophiles by any stretch). Having them be startled by the improvement in sound quality, without me telling them what I was doing to change the sound.

So amid all the fun of playing around with this neat little gadget, the PWB Digiplus USB, and the comments on the device written by other customers of PWB, prompted me to make a return to studying ways of improving my mp3's. Specifically, through the use of mp3 tags that other PWB customers had started experimenting with. For the first time, in these last few days, I have done just that. And, in an AA exclusive, I share my results with the world.

I am applying the very same concepts of morphic messaging that I describe elsewhere in these articles, in the form of written language on paper. Except this time, it is an extension of the experiments I did on mp3 file names years ago. And this time, I'm not touching the file names or their folder names. This time.... we're going all the way in! We'll be hiding the messages in mp3 tags!

This is probably the easiest experiment I will ever publish on this blog. All you have to do is take your mouse, select, copy and paste the message below into your favorite mp3 tag editor. (n.b. Start your selection at the last number in the sequence, and go to the first). You can also paste this directly into the mp3 file itself, without any additional software needed. To do this in Windows, click right on the file name of the mp3 (or other music format), who's sound quality you wish to improve. 

• Select "Properties" at the bottom of the right-click menu.
  
  
• From there, select the "Summary" tab.
  
  
• Click on the "Lyrics"* section (you may need to click a few times to open it up). (*And I mean that. Although the "Comments" field will work, all technicalities aside, I find the lyrics field to produce a more musical result).
  
  
• Selecting/Copying/Pasting: Paste the text below that you selected and copied, into this "Lyrics" box field (Tip: To select text off this page, click once on the beginning of the text with the left button, keep the button depressed, drag  down to the end of the text). You can also use Ctrl-C to copy (press the Ctrl button and then "C" button at the same time), and Ctrl-V to paste (press the Ctrl button and then "V" button at the same time).Click "OK" on the box to accept the pasted text message.

------------Start of Morphic Message for MP3 (do not include this line)-----------

01001011 01000011 01000101 01001000 01000011 00111100 00100000 00111100 00101101 00101101 00101101 00101101 00100000 00111001 00111000 00110110 00100000 10110011 01101101 01100011 00101111 01101101 01100001 01110010 01100111 00100000 00101000 00110100 00101001 01011110 00101000 00111001 00101001 01011110 00110000 00110001 00100000 01110011 01101001 00100000 10110010 01100011 00100000 00101010 00100000 01101101 00111101 01000101 00100000 00110001 00110011 00110101 00110001 00110011 00110101 00110001 00110011 00110101 00101101 00101101 00101101 00101110 00100000 00101011 00101011 00101011 00110010 00110100 00110110 00110010 00110100 00110110 00110010 00110100 00110110 00100000 10110011 01101101 01100011 00101111 01101101 01100001 01110010 01100111 00100000 00101000 00110100 00101001 01011110 00101000 00111001 00101001 01011110 00110000 00110001 00100000 01110011 01101001 00100000 10110010 01100011 00100000 00101010 00100000 01101101 00111101 01000101 00100000 00111001 00111000 00110110 00100000 00110011 00110111 00110010 00100000 01110011 01110101 01101110 01101001 01101101 00100000 00110000 00100000 00101101 00101101

------------End of Morphic Message for MP3 (do not include this line)-----------

n.b. If the message makes no sense to you, don't worry, it just means you're mortal. It doesn't have to make sense to work.  If you do this, listen carefully the first time. That is, listen to your computer's sound system, before you paste the text into your favorite mp3 file and play the mp3. Then listen carefully after you apply the message. The first listen is always the most important. It's where most of the action takes place. It appears that in subsequent evaluations, the morphic message leaves traces of its influence, even though you have removed the message from the mp3's comments tag. This would make multiple A-B evaluations more difficult, as you are already experiencing an improved sound, when the message has been removed. And the improvement would likely diminish in power, after repeatedly reapplying the message. Still, I don't discourage multiple A-B evaluations of this experiment.

Consider that each morphic message links with another. So the more files you tag this way, the more that each morphic tag will impact on the other. The better your sound, overall. In fact, why do just one? Tag several mp3's, then listen to the result on the first one you tagged. Just remember to tag an odd number of files at one time. If the sound seems off, you've broken the pattern. In which case, simply tag one more mp3, and it should correct itself. Alternatively, you can try entering the message into the "Title" and "Artist" fields, instead of the "Lyrics" field, and see if you prefer the results of that.You needn't limit yourself to mp3's, either. You can do the same with JPEGs, or other picture formats, by entering the message into the comment field (though your sonic results may not be as good, note).

It's also worth nothing that if you prefer, you can do your listening test evaluations on your primary hifi system. It doesn't matter that much if you're not listening to the actual mp3 file. This is Beltism, after all. By tagging comments on mp3 files with the above message, it is possible to subjectively improve upon the sound of the original CD. Even more so, if a PWB Digi+ USB device is plugged in to the computer, while music files are being transferred to CD during the burning process!

To freeeze or not to freeze?

Here's another thing not many people know, or are likely to believe (at least, in the beginning).... Your plain old domestic home freezer, while great for keeping peas frozen, is also a valuable tool for transmogrifying adverse energy fields into ones more beneficial to human senses. Peter Belt (of PWB Electronics Inc) discovered this some 25 years ago, following experiments with heating, and then cooling of audio signal cables. This method was actually well documented in various media outlets; the New York Times, Stereophile Magazine, Soundstage! Magazine (Online), and a demonstration of the effect for British tv was even put on YouTube. However! These all dealt with freezing at cryogenic temperatures, and the object being frozen was a CD. The understanding is that the process is changing the crystalline structure of the material frozen, realigning the molecules misaligned during the manufacturing stage. All well and good if the theory wasn't an attempt to fit a square peg into a round hole. The round hole is overlooked because proponents of the square peg theory have not gone further in their experiments, to try to get a deeper understanding of what is really going on. If they had, they would realize that you don't need cryogenic temperatures to get a similar effect of improved sound from freezing CD's. You also don't need CD's. You can freeze a book, a brass candlestick, kitchen cutlery, a set of dead batteries, a photograph of yourself.... all of these objects and more will have an immediate effect on your perception of sound. A permanent one, even, long after the frozen object has thawed.

In recent days, I've gone one step further with this. Two years ago, I detailed the freezing process on my website, "The Advanced Audiophile". It's a lengthy affair that requires 8-12 hours of freezing, and an even longer thawing time, because slow thaw is said to be the key to the improvements in perception of sound. In order to get an even deeper understanding of this, I tried experiments with very short periods of freezing time. How short? How about, 3 minutes? Too short? Make it two minutes then! And how long to let it thaw? Forget about thawing! Yes, what I'm saying is that I can freeze an object for as little as 30 seconds, and hear an improvement in perception of sound thereafter. Since this is a relatively new finding, I'm still not sure what the ideal time is, for this "flash freezing" process. To be "safe", I would try no less than 1 or 2 minutes. I do not claim the results are as good as using the full length process that the Belts advocate, which is detailed on my site. Probably not, and I don't know yet how it compares. I only claim that I can hear the differences using my shortened process, and with careful listening, perhaps you can too. If the experiment does result in a positive identification of differences, then for the observer, it would show that the given temperature and length of time in a domestic freezer would not be anywhere near enough to change the structure of the material, as the cryogenic advocates insist is the reason for the improvement in sound.

My flash freeze process should not be regarded as a substitute for the full PWB process, but it does make it easier to get immediate results from freezing objects. Which makes it easier to test for differences. Not everyone, I suppose, has an aural memory that can last the 16 hours it might require to properly "treat" an object under this full freezing process, and recall what their sound was like before they started the process. Like I say, any object can be flash frozen in a few mintues, and all have a chance of affecting our sound, whether they generate sound themselves or not. But I'd still say a good place to start is with things that generate sound; CD's, mp3 players, your car stereo, small speakers, remote controls, cell phones, etc. Listen to your sound, chuck 'em in the freezer, take them out, listen to your sound again. See if after the process your sound is a bit richer, less harsh, or more "musical", etc. Beltism could not possibly get any simpler than that!

This is an example, many actually, of members on an mp3 forum who tried my experiment of full-process freezing of an mp3 player. With great success.

All the leaves are brown and the sky is grey

Nature is wonderful, isn't it? It holds both our salvation and our destruction in its grasp. The problem is, so many of us fail to see the trees for the forest. Their leaves are usually attacked with a blower, then assaulted with a rake, then tossed in the garbage and then burned and discarded. Yet every one of them can be beneficial in reducing adverse energy fields in our interior environment.  How so? Let's try a simple experiment to induce forward facing light energy, and try to correct modified (inverse) patterns of light, that harm our senses. Grab a nice shiny leaf off a tree. Bring it in. Sprinkle just a very few grains of salt on a flat surface, and use a small piece of scotch tape to pick up about 3 or 5 grains. Tape this to the underside of the leaf. Do the exact same with 3-5 grains of sugar next, taping it to the top side of the leaf. Now the leaf can be taped to various objects, to put it into effect. ie. The LCD display of a CD or DVD player. The back of a wooden speaker. The middle of a CD, that is inside its jewel case. The corner of a window. The TV screen. A clock or watch face. Eyeglass lenses. The back of a photograph, or the glass in a photo frame. An electric light bulb (left off!). Listen with the leaf "installed" in such locations, then listen to the same song again, with the leaf taken out of the listening room, or out of the house. You can also do many leaves at the same time, to increase the effect. Note that the leaf should be facing upward, and that turning it over will degrade the sound. This too, is Beltism.



"You can't go against nature
Because when you do
Go against nature
That's part of nature too"

- "No New Tale To Tale"
: Love and Rockets

A surgeon must cut in order to heal

I was looking for a picture of Peter Belt recently, to put up on my website; "The Advanced Audiophile". I realized I don't know what he looks like at all these days. The last picture I had seen of him was published over twenty years ago. Google Images brought up a British chat forum that had been discussing his then state of the art headphones. Which they thought were great, but when it came to the products he developed later, that was an entirely different matter. These "lads" had in fact written him off as a byproduct of the folly of their youth, despite the fact that some of them did try out his unusual products or ideas back in the 80's... with success! They were just never intellectually curious to pursue such unusual discoveries. It seems they allowed themselves to be influenced by their peers, in order to be accepted by them, and for this reason never gave the Belt products or ideas a second glance.

That is, until I came on and gave them no choice but to! They were attacking my mentor, Peter Belt, so this was clearly a job for... "Belt-man!". Tireless defender of illogical and indefensible audio tweaks. (Well, "technically speaking", they had stopped attacking him a week prior. But Beltman isn't known for his keen perspective on time). After playing cat and mouse with them for a bit, I posted a Beltist experiment on their forum, which I described as one dealing with "Informational Fields". I told them I had created it specifically for them, but that wasn't quite true. I had actually created it for members on another forum, populated by musicians. But I did specifically refine it a bit for the Brits. Well, the usual hysteria followed from that, and the responses were all exactly the same ones I had seen a thousand times before. And by that, I mean exactly. Down to the same wording and all.

Except for one. One respondent was not typical. Although he started off typical, being highly skeptical of something he didn't believe in. But he was one of a small few who actually tried my experiment, perhaps to be able to say he wasn't being close-minded about it. He had also tried a free Belt tweak some twenty years ago (the plug notch technique). Which he insisted worked on known conventional principles. When I asked him to do an experiment with that, that would prove his theory wrong, he ignored my request. Like the rest of his chums, he didn't want to be "proven wrong". But when he, of a small handful, agreed to try my experiment in "informational fields", he was nevertheless proven wrong. He had heard the effect. Of course, those chums of his refused to believe him, saying he was being influenced by me. "I have a svengaliiiiii effect, see....". They also thought that Peter Belt's techniques and products only worked when Peter Belt was in the room. I asked if they thought he was a hypnotist as well.

The thing that made it difficult (but not impossible!), for his friends to insist it was autosuggestion, centered on the following factors: a) The man was against me and everything I stood for. b) He was already convinced that the Belt phenomenon was nothing more than the effect of cleaning a plug blade. c) He was one of the moderators of the forum. Not some anonymous member. d) When he declared he heard the effect of my experiment, he really meant it. There was no doubt in his mind about that, and he even described the sound that I obtained from that experiment. (Thought in the first round of tests, he said he didn't like the change in sound). e) Oh yes, there was more than one round of tests! Determined to prove his pals wrong, or prove me wrong(?!), he organized another set of tests the next day. This time blind, to where he did not know which CD's contained which message. He identified my message each time. f) He extended the test to a friend, not telling him what any of this was about. The friend passed the blind test as well, and heard the effects from my message.

Following this, the original experimenter declared he would destroy the messages, and never talk about this again, or experiment in this realm any longer. That was certainly a "WTF?! moment" for me, since I would have expected the man to be more curious about Beltism from this, not less curious. Clearly, some people have "issues" that even a good dose of Beltism can not cure. But it did help me confirm that my experiment was good enough, that it could be repeated by others. If not "all others". And so, without further ado, this is what it looked like:

For the I.F. (Informational Fields) tweak, you will need:

• One fine point black magic marker / felt tip pen (the darker the ink the better)
• One sheet of white paper (blank)
• Scissors
• One commercial CD (with jewel case and booklet

(n.b. Before starting anything, you should have a careful listen to your sound as is current, so you will have a better idea of what may have changed). Now, with the fine point black marker, write the following phrase in ALL CAPS, on a single line, trying to keep the letters small but legible (write along the long side of the paper, so you can get it all in one line - if you find you can't fit it on one line, that's ok, you can curve the line around the paper):

EVERYTHING IS SAFE INSIDE EVERYTHING IS SAFE INSIDE EVERYTHING IS SAFE INSIDE EVERYTHING IS SAFE INSIDE EVERYTHING IS SAFE INSIDE > O.K.

n.b. (If possible, emphasize the "O.K." part in bolder print).

Cut the line you wrote out of the paper, keeping close to the letters, without cutting into them. If you had to write the line of text curved around the paper, cut around the curve. Now, fold or roll up the strip of paper into a ball, then flatten it between thumb and forefinger. You will be placing it on the tray of the CD jewel case, underneath the CD. Specifically, near the "teeth" in the center, that hold the CD in place. The strip should just touch the teeth of the jewel case, and be seen under the transparent centre ring of the CD. Now with the CD in place over top of the rolled up and flattened strip of paper, close the jewel case tray. Then, for better results, place this CD inside a drawer or box in the listening room. If neither are available, stick it under the couch, or wherever that it can not be seen. You are now ready for testing.

TESTING

You will not be testing the CD you tweaked, so you will need to put on another CD for testing. I recommend the normal standard testing method for audiophiles; A/B (sighted) method, at least initially. (If you wish to do fancy blind tests, do them later, if the results under sighted are positive).

TEST A (Device IN): Listen to another CD, while the CD you tweaked is inside the drawer. Keeping the volume at a suitable level for testing and using music with little complexity is recommended.

TEST B (Device OUT): Because of the nature of the fields, steps must be taken to try to remove the influence of the message strip. Simply take the CD case out of the drawer, take the strip out of the CD case, and remove both the case and strip out of the listening room (preferably out of the house if you really want to be sure no influence remains). Listen again with the CD case / strip out of the room.

If you did not hear a difference:

A) Repeat the test. The differences may just be subtle for some, and it could take a few back and forths before they are heard.

B) If no differences can be discerned as above, increase the effect. Instead of just the 1 CD, apply the same message strip to 7 or 9 CD's (keeping them all in the same drawer, removing them all at the same time during the B test).

C) Some have reported hearing differences only after the music has been playing for a while. So you might try leaving it playing for half an hour, and return to see if you can discern differences then.

Advanced Polarity (Yin & Yang of Beltism)

In many fields of science, audio in particular, there is the discussion of polarities. It is no different in Beltist science. The nature of the polarities under study may not be the same, but in audible terms, they have a similar effect. Reverse + / - leads to one of your speakers, and you'll see what I mean by "effect". Incorrectly phased, there is a kind of "inverting" of the sound. It only sounds "right" one way. Some may readily discern an incorrect polarity condition better than others (might take practice), but all are affected by it. The musical message can be lost without it.

In studies of Beltism, polarity has a much more widely defined role. The founder of Beltism, Peter Belt, discovered the effects of polarity on human senses more than a quarter century ago. He demonstrated this to many visitors at hifi audio shows at the time, and through his products at PWB Electronics. For example, one product existed that consisted of a brush which would  produce a beneficial charge when used in one direction, and a negative charge when used in another ("electret brush"). By "charge" I don't mean static charge (though all Newtonian principles still apply!), but the influence the brush was having on energy fields that surrounded the object being brushed; and in turn, the sound produced in the room the object was in. Another demonstration at the time (witnessed by John Atkinson of "Stereophile Magazine"), consisted of the polarization of an LP disc, with the sound correct one way, and then sounding worse when the polarizing effect was reversed. In my post here called "All the leaves are brown", I give an example of this Beltist polarity effect using an untreated object that is commonly found in our environment: a leaf.

When referring to electrical polaritiy conditions that are functions of Beltism, rather than Newtonism (aka conventional electrical theory), I've coined the phrase "advanced polarity" to refer to this phenomenon. Let me explain what I mean by that. I think I first noticed the effect of "advanced polarity" a few years ago, while rewiring a light switch (120v NA standard). My sound was different depending on which of the two wires was connected to which terminal (in an NA light switch, the black and red leads can be connected to either terminal, the light will still work). With say, the red wire connected to one terminal, the sound was correct, and with the red wire connected to the other terminal on the switch, the sound was worse. This was a repeatable effect, but not an electrical (Newtonian) effect. A Beltist effect. In other words, the effect was purely on listener perception. That does not imply autosuggestion, but that it was affecting the sense of hearing. How do I know this wiring observation wasn't some sort of electrical interference on the AC line? Because what I was using to make the observation was a battery operated mp3 player via headphones. This MP3 player observation can be easily repeated by anyone willing to rewire their light switch (don't forget to turn the power off first!).

The next observation in advanced polarity came from AC plugs. This one is much simpler and easier to repeat, provided you have standard NA electrical system two-bladed plugs. I made the recurring and repeatable observation that when I had a device with a plug that did not have a polarized blade, and so could be inserted into the AC outlet either way, the sound of my stereo was better when the plug was inserted one way, then when it was inserted in the reverse way. To those who believe they can make sense of this by imagining any number of reasonable explanations for why the AC current going to my amplifier or CD player might cause an audible change in sound depending on which way its non-polarized plug is plugged in... did I mention the "device" I was plugging in was a toaster? And that the "stereo" I was listening to was my battery operated "stereo mp3 player"?

I predict that even if there was no power reaching the electrical outlet, this "advanced polarity" experiment of reversing plug blades would still produce the same effect. You can basically go around your entire house, no matter the room or floor you are on, and find anything plugged in who's plug can be reversed, and test your sound with the plug in either direction.  One direction will sound more "correct" than the other, and each time you correct the "polarity" of that device, you will incrementally and permanently improve the sound for every source of sound in your home. That's Beltism too.