Pop music depends on rhythmic expectations. Sometimes an artist will deliberately mess with those expectations. Other times the way you hear things will be misguided.

This happens sometimes when you turn on the radio in the middle of a song. Suddenly what the musicians think of as an upbeat you hear as a downbeat, or vice versa. Take for example this clip that starts a split second after the song does.

The rhythm guitarist seems to be playing 1 2&3 4&. The lead guitarist seems to be playing on the ands of 1 and 3. But when the drums come in something’s weird. Turns out you’ve been hearing it all wrong. The rhythm is syncopated, and the lead is playing downbeats.

The first two songs on Les Savy Fav’s “Root for Ruin” (2010) do this to me every time.

“Appetites” starts with a misleading countoff that makes me wonder if the rhythmic disorientation isn’t intentional. The guitar motif sounds for all the world like it starts on the 1. The drums are doing something unconventional, but nothing to persuade me I’m wrong. This rhythm sense persists when the bass and vocals join in. It persists right up to the B section (0:38), where now it’s clear I was mistaken.

Exhibit A: Song starts on a downbeat.

Exhibit B: Song starts on an upbeat.

“Dirty Knails” fools me for even longer (until the chorus at 1:11), with the whole band landing hard every bar on what I can’t help but hear as the 1. But I’ve been an eighth note behind the whole time — it’s actually the and of 4.

Even if I start the songs over, I can’t hear the syncopation without assistance. Which is both frustrating and kinda neat. We’re so used to hearing snare on 2 and 4, it’s refreshing to hear it somewhere else.

Does this happen to you? Send examples. One more I’ve found is “I Follow You” by Melody’s Echo Chamber, although there the spell is broken as soon as the drums start.