MAE is more than just a band. It’s also a theory developed by drummer Jacob Marshall while studying at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. Wikipedia defines Multi-sensory Aesthetic Experience as:

“Taking a passage of sound that evokes an emotion and translating that into a visual, based on all of the different variables that contribute to it.”

In other words, a song is more than just a sound, it can also be perceived as a certain color or smell. The band’s second full length album, The Everglow, seems to incorporate this theory in the style of an audio children’s book complete with prologue and epilogue instructing you to turn the pages of the colorful insert at certain points in the music. Their show Saturday night at the 9:30 Club also opened with this prologue, and accordingly, the majority of their set consisted of tracks off of The Everglow “concept album.” The sound is unique, and the lyrics above average and poetic. But as far as evoking emotions is concerned, with a collection of songs that don’t offer much variation, by the end of the night it is definitely possible to have a sensory overload.