Alright, Brah! It is 3:47 AM. You are staring at the ceiling. You should be sleeping. You have a meeting in five hours. And yet, your brain — the most sophisticated biological machine in the known universe — has decided that NOW is the perfect time to replay the chorus of a song you last heard at a shopping mall in 2009. Over and over. On a loop. With no off switch.
Maybe it is “Baby Shark.” Maybe it is that one kroncong song your grandmother used to hum. Maybe it is the jingle from a kerepek advertisement that you did not even realise you remembered until your brain pulled it out of cold storage at the worst possible moment. Whatever it is, it will not stop. And you are losing your mind.
Congratulations. You have an earworm. Not the actual worm kind — the psychological kind. And science has been studying this phenomenon for decades. Let us dig in. While humming that song. Which is still playing. Sorry.
What Makes a Song Stick?
Not all songs become earworms. You do not leave a jazz concert with a free-form saxophone solo looping in your head for three days (and if you do, please see a specialist). Earworms target specific musical traits: simple melodies, repetitive structures, and an unusual interval or rhythmic pattern that makes the song just “unusual” enough to grab your brain’s attention without being so complex that your brain gives up trying to remember it.
The researchers who study this — and yes, there are actual scientists who dedicate their careers to understanding why “Call Me Maybe” is a biological weapon — have identified several features common to earworm songs: a fast tempo (gets your brain excited), a simple melodic contour (easy to remember), and an unusual interval jump (the “hook” that makes it sticky). The chorus of a pop song is basically a scientifically designed brain-penetration device. And it works. Oh, it works.
Famous earworm examples: Queen’s “We Will Rock You” (stomp-stomp-clap — you are doing it right now, are you not?), the Ghostbusters theme (“who you gonna call?” — please do not answer), and — I am sorry in advance — “Baby Shark.” That last one has been studied specifically. The researchers concluded it is “optimally annoying.” That is a direct quote from a peer-reviewed journal. Science is beautiful.
Why 3 AM? The Brain’s Night Shift
Earworms attack most aggressively when you are trying to sleep. This is not a coincidence. Your brain is a terrible roommate. During the day, your conscious mind is busy — work, conversations, deciding what to eat, remembering where you parked. The earworm cannot get through because there is too much traffic. But at night, when you finally lie down and the conscious mind powers down, the auditory cortex — the part of your brain that processes sound — decides it is time to party.
Without external stimulation, your brain starts generating its own. And because the auditory cortex is connected to memory centres, it pulls up the catchiest thing it can find. Often, it pulls up the worst possible thing. Your brain has access to every beautiful symphony ever composed, and it chooses to replay the nasi lemak seller’s ringtone from three weeks ago. This is not a bug. This is your brain trolling you. On purpose. While you try to sleep.
The Chewing Gum Solution (Seriously)
Here is the part where science actually helps. Researchers at the University of Reading discovered that chewing gum can reduce earworms. The theory is that the act of chewing engages the same neural pathways involved in “inner speech” and auditory imagery — the mental processes that generate the earworm in the first place. By keeping your jaw busy, you crowd out the song loop. It is the neurological equivalent of telling someone “I cannot hear you, I am eating.”
Other scientifically-supported remedies include: listening to the entire song (your brain might be looping the chorus because it is trying to “complete” the song — giving it closure can shut it down), engaging in a moderately difficult cognitive task (sudoku, crossword, mental arithmetic — something that demands just enough brain power to compete with the earworm), or simply accepting it and letting it run its course. Earworms almost always disappear on their own within 30 minutes — unless you actively fight them, which perversely makes them stronger. The brain is a petty creature.
The Upside of the Earworm
Not all earworms are bad. Some researchers argue that earworms serve a purpose — they are your brain’s way of processing, memorising, and emotionally engaging with music. An earworm for a song you love is not an annoyance. It is your brain saying, “Hey, remember this? This is good. Let us play it again.” The problem is not the mechanism. The problem is that your brain has terrible taste at 3 AM.
Also — and this is genuinely beautiful — earworms are one of the few universal human experiences. Every culture, every language, every age group gets songs stuck in their head. It is a reminder that, underneath all our differences, human brains work in remarkably similar ways. You, me, the Prime Minister, the teh tarik uncle at the mamak, the toddler in the shopping cart at AEON — all of us have been personally victimised by “Baby Shark.” That is unity. That is connection. That is the human condition.
So the next time a song gets stuck in your head at 3 AM, do not fight it. Chew some gum. Give it closure by listening to the full song. Or just lie there and appreciate the miracle that is your brain — a biological organ that can compose, remember, replay, and be intensely annoyed by music, all at the same time, all by itself. That is not a glitch. That is a feature. An annoying, unskippable, wonderfully human feature. 🎵🧠