We know music is pleasurable, the question is why?

> the same feeling as something very real like the feeling of seeing the New York skyline for the first time

I think that feeling is highly variable depending on the person. I remember the feeling I had the first time I drove over the bridge on I-40 into Memphis as an adult - the industry along the Mississippi River was awe-inspiring to me. Ugly, sure, but it also represented a huge amount of human accomplishment; it took thousands of years of learning, engineering, building, and improving to build those petroleum tanks and the infrastructure that they support (and that supports them).

Seeing the NYC skyline for the first time made me really anxious, almost to the point of anger. So many people in such a small area, living and working together packed so tightly. All I wanted to do was finish what I had to do there and leave as quickly as possible.

Out of curiosity - have you ever seen the Milky Way from a truly dark location with no light pollution? I think that probably inspires a very similar feeling that you've described.

This article did not mention overtones:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overtone

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmonic_series_(music)

Combinations of frequencies that form simple integer ratios are naturally perceived as being consonant, no culture or upbringing needed. As the ratios begin to involve higher integers and become more complex, the intervals they produce are considered more dissonant.

For instance, in ancient Greece, the scales were constructed by combining intervals where the integer ratios have a prime number no higher than 3. The result is a very consonant but almost bland music. Something you could easily fall asleep to.

The major and minor scales from which classical music is composed are made by combining intervals with a prime no higher than 5. This adds more dissonance and makes things a bit more interesting.

Scales based around higher prime numbers (7,11,13,..) are outside the scope of mainstream music although jazz is said to approximate the scales that could be built off the '7-limit' intervals, which explains its more dissonant nature (heavy use of tritone which has a ratio of 7:5, and the 'minor seventh' approximates the interval with a ratio of 7:4).

That covers consonance, but it doesn't explain emotional affect. I think one example that is at least a part of the explanation can be seen in the distinction between the overtones and undertones.

The major scale (and more specifically the major chord) of today's western music is generally considered to be happy, confident, uplifted, etc. The major chord appears naturally in the harmonic series of overtones (any 3 notes played together whose frequency ratio is 4:5:6).

The minor chord, on the other hand, appears naturally in the undertone series which is just an inversion of the overtones (1/4:1/5:1/6). It also occurs in nature like the overtones, although less frequently.

I may have flubbed some details as I'm writing off the top of my head mostly but I think it covers the gist of how harmony can contribute to the perception of music. There is of course also the rhythm and the sense of expectations/irony involved in writing as well.

Well I didn't meant it to be in negative way. Sorry its answering the `how` part of question not `why`, but whatever be the reason of `why`, the final thing that brain finds pleasurable is because of dopamine. For example, lets say a person like classical music but might dislike rap or metal. This is because his brain is accustomed to classical music and the more he listens to it, the more dopamine is released. However, in case of other genres, brain is not accustomed to it and thus the pleasure hormone might not work.

I'm curious, which musical traditions favor music built on scales from dissonant intervals? Do you mean music which is more percussion oriented?

It’s very normal and maybe universal for music to be distracting. The only difference is some people don’t realize it.