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Basically the premise is there's this radio station that suddenly begins emitting a white-noise sound that causes everyone who hears it to feel immensely relaxed and happy.

I remember one early point of the plot involved a grocery store that went completely silent because everyone inside it stopped what they were doing and just stood there enjoying the "radio drug" (I think it was being broadcast via the loudspeakers). Later on, the entire city is completely still when people at home tune in and are so high/relaxed that they're even forgetting to eat. A scene where boy scouts show up to one family's house to try and save them (don't remember how they were unaffected by the radio). The story finishes with a TV broadcast of a reporter commenting on the bizarre phenomena who mid-sentence starts feeling relaxed and praises the radio station and encourages everyone else to give it a listen.

I read this back in high school for an English class and have been scouring the internet to try to find its name; every former classmate I've asked doesn't remember reading it either. Either my friends are as forgetful as I am or this is some false-memory level weirdness because I specifically remember reading it

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This could be "The Euphio Question" by Kurt Vonnegut.

The protagonist, a radio announcer and a scientist invent a receiver that picks up the music of the spheres. It induces bliss in anyone who hears it, to the point that they will stop everything to listen and die of thirst, or cold or anything else that might happen to them. And, being the bright people they are they play it to people...

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    Pulled it off the shelf and read it - had no remembrance of it at all - looks like you nailed it. Jan 31, 2021 at 2:54
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    That's the one! Knew I wasn't going crazy. Just bought the collection to re-read it, thanks for finding Jan 31, 2021 at 9:05
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    Why am I even surprised by that? Of course it's Vonnegut. This particular brand of absurdism is always Vonnegut.
    – Kevin
    Jan 31, 2021 at 9:28
  • The Outer Limits also has an episode called The Music of the Spheres that references this. Jan 31, 2021 at 10:58
  • Clarke's "Tales from the White Hart" has a similar story about a scientist who invents the ultimate earworm. Jan 31, 2021 at 21:38

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