diff --git a/docs/audio-doctrine.md b/docs/audio-doctrine.md
index f721c98..1506d54 100644
--- a/docs/audio-doctrine.md
+++ b/docs/audio-doctrine.md
@@ -326,6 +326,13 @@ records in the `.cc` CultCache/CultMesh store and references them from each
 trial result. Qdrant/Ollama retrieval may derive vectors from those records, but
 the `.cc` records remain truth.
 
+Noise is not a scene by itself. Background air, dust, codec grit, tape, vinyl,
+and room color need a role owner that shapes spectrum and time. Prefer
+`texture`/`noise_texture` sugar or an equivalently gated, band-shaped explicit
+voice for scene noise. Full-duration raw `wave=noise` beds with broad filters
+are failed evidence: they sound like broken subtractive synthesis because that
+is exactly what they are.
+
 Do not confuse high metric agreement with musical success. The game context,
 the reference sound, and the user’s ear still outrank the spreadsheet. Annoying,
 but civilization has survived worse.
diff --git a/src/AquaSynth.Core/PatchScript.cs b/src/AquaSynth.Core/PatchScript.cs
index 44a3a99..fee8c50 100644
--- a/src/AquaSynth.Core/PatchScript.cs
+++ b/src/AquaSynth.Core/PatchScript.cs
@@ -275,6 +275,10 @@ public static class PatchScript
                     FlushPendingOperatorGraph();
                     Voices.Add(ParseVoice(ExpandVoiceFields(fields, line), VoicePath(Voices.Count), line));
                     break;
+                case "texture":
+                    FlushPendingOperatorGraph();
+                    AddNoiseTexture(fields, line);
+                    break;
                 case "acoustic_voice":
                     FlushPendingOperatorGraph();
                     Voices.Add(ParseAcousticVoice(ExpandVoiceFields(fields, line), VoicePath(Voices.Count), line));
@@ -2604,6 +2608,59 @@ public static class PatchScript
                 ("depth", GetAny(fields, ["depth", "amount", "mix"], "1"))), line);
         }
 
+        private void AddNoiseTexture(IReadOnlyDictionary<string, string> fields, int line)
+        {
+            var name = SafeName(GetAny(fields, ["name", "n"], $"texture_{Voices.Count}"));
+            var role = NoiseTextureRole(GetAny(fields, ["role", "kind", "type"], name));
+            var duration = GetAny(fields, ["sustain", "s", "gate", "hold", "duration"], "30");
+            var gainText = GetAny(fields, ["gain", "g"], role.Gain.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture));
+            var gatePath = GetAny(fields, ["path", "gate_path"], $"/textures/{name}/gate");
+
+            if (!gainText.StartsWith('@'))
+            {
+                var gainValue = Math.Clamp(ParseFloat(gainText, line), 0, 1);
+                if (TryGetAny(fields, ["pattern", "pat", "steps"], out var pattern))
+                {
+                    AddPatternCurve(SyntheticFields(
+                        ("name", $"{name}_gate"),
+                        ("path", gatePath),
+                        ("pattern", pattern),
+                        ("step", GetAny(fields, ["step", "step_seconds", "dt"], role.StepSeconds.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                        ("high", GetAny(fields, ["high", "on", "hit"], gainValue.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                        ("low", GetAny(fields, ["low", "off", "rest"], (gainValue * role.RestScale).ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                        ("loop", GetAny(fields, ["loop"], "true"))), line);
+                }
+                else
+                {
+                    EnsureParameter(gatePath, gainValue, 0, Math.Max(gainValue * 2, 0.001f), 0.001f, "", line);
+                    AddControlCurve(SyntheticFields(
+                        ("name", $"{name}_gate_motion"),
+                        ("path", gatePath),
+                        ("points", TextureGatePoints(gainValue, role.MotionScale)),
+                        ("interp", "linear"),
+                        ("loop", "true")), line);
+                }
+
+                gainText = "@" + gatePath;
+            }
+
+            Voices.Add(ParseVoice(ExpandVoiceFields(SyntheticFields(
+                ("wave", "noise"),
+                ("freq", GetAny(fields, ["freq", "frequency"], role.FrequencyHz.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("gain", gainText),
+                ("attack", GetAny(fields, ["attack", "a"], role.AttackSeconds.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("sustain", duration),
+                ("decay", GetAny(fields, ["decay", "d", "release", "rel"], role.DecaySeconds.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("noise", GetAny(fields, ["noise", "nz"], "1")),
+                ("hpf", GetAny(fields, ["hpf", "h"], role.HighPass.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("lpf", GetAny(fields, ["lpf", "l"], role.LowPass.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("bpf", GetAny(fields, ["bpf", "bp"], role.BandPass.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("bpf_q", GetAny(fields, ["bpf_q", "bpq"], role.BandPassQ.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("tremolo", GetAny(fields, ["tremolo", "tr"], role.TremoloDepth.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("tremolo_hz", GetAny(fields, ["tremolo_hz", "th"], role.TremoloHz.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture))),
+                ("drive", GetAny(fields, ["drive"], role.Drive.ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture)))), line), VoicePath(Voices.Count), line));
+        }
+
         private void EnsureParameter(string path, float defaultValue, float min, float max, float step, string unit, int line)
         {
             if (_parameters.Any(parameter => parameter.Path.Equals(path, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)))
@@ -3447,6 +3504,7 @@ public static class PatchScript
         "acoustic_network" or "port_network" or "network" => "acoustic_network",
         "vocal_network" or "vocalnetwork" => "vocal_network",
         "v" or "voice" => "voice",
+        "texture" or "noise_texture" or "scene_texture" or "dust" or "air" or "air_wash" or "codec_bed" => "texture",
         "acoustic" or "acoustic_voice" or "av" => "acoustic_voice",
         "vocal" or "vocal_voice" or "vv" => "vocal_voice",
         "tract" or "vt" or "tractvoice" or "tract_voice" => "tract",
@@ -3674,6 +3732,50 @@ public static class PatchScript
     private static Dictionary<string, string> SyntheticFields(params (string Key, string Value)[] fields) =>
         fields.ToDictionary(field => field.Key, field => field.Value, StringComparer.OrdinalIgnoreCase);
 
+    private static string TextureGatePoints(float gain, float motionScale)
+    {
+        var low = Math.Max(0, gain * Math.Max(0, 1 - motionScale));
+        var high = Math.Min(1, gain * (1 + motionScale));
+        return string.Join(",", new[]
+        {
+            (0f, gain),
+            (0.37f, high),
+            (0.91f, low),
+            (1.43f, gain * 0.85f),
+            (2.11f, high * 0.9f),
+            (3.0f, gain)
+        }.Select(point =>
+            point.Item1.ToString("0.######", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture) +
+            ":" +
+            point.Item2.ToString("0.######", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture)));
+    }
+
+    private static NoiseTextureDefaults NoiseTextureRole(string role)
+    {
+        var normalized = role.ToLowerInvariant().Replace("_", "-", StringComparison.Ordinal);
+        if (normalized.Contains("dust", StringComparison.Ordinal) || normalized.Contains("hat", StringComparison.Ordinal))
+        {
+            return new(7600, 0.075f, 0.001f, 0.09f, 0.78f, 0.42f, 0.66f, 4.5f, 0.22f, 5.0f, 0.16f, 0.08f, 0.35f, 0.125f);
+        }
+
+        if (normalized.Contains("codec", StringComparison.Ordinal) || normalized.Contains("bit", StringComparison.Ordinal))
+        {
+            return new(4200, 0.045f, 0.015f, 0.55f, 0.38f, 0.34f, 0.44f, 5.5f, 0.18f, 1.7f, 0.20f, 0.18f, 0.45f, 0.25f);
+        }
+
+        if (normalized.Contains("room", StringComparison.Ordinal) || normalized.Contains("bed", StringComparison.Ordinal))
+        {
+            return new(1800, 0.04f, 0.05f, 0.8f, 0.14f, 0.32f, 0.24f, 0.9f, 0.20f, 0.23f, 0.05f, 0.35f, 0.55f, 0.5f);
+        }
+
+        if (normalized.Contains("tape", StringComparison.Ordinal) || normalized.Contains("vinyl", StringComparison.Ordinal))
+        {
+            return new(2600, 0.04f, 0.02f, 0.7f, 0.22f, 0.48f, 0.34f, 1.2f, 0.15f, 0.67f, 0.10f, 0.25f, 0.5f, 0.25f);
+        }
+
+        return new(5800, 0.045f, 0.02f, 0.55f, 0.58f, 0.48f, 0.56f, 1.8f, 0.24f, 0.31f, 0.08f, 0.24f, 0.5f, 0.25f);
+    }
+
     private static string PointsText(IEnumerable<(float Time, float Value)> points) =>
         string.Join(",", points.Select(point =>
             point.Time.ToString("0.######", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture) +
@@ -3886,4 +3988,20 @@ public static class PatchScript
         return fields.Where(pair => !excluded.Contains(pair.Key))
             .ToDictionary(pair => pair.Key, pair => pair.Value, StringComparer.OrdinalIgnoreCase);
     }
+
+    private sealed record NoiseTextureDefaults(
+        float FrequencyHz,
+        float Gain,
+        float AttackSeconds,
+        float DecaySeconds,
+        float HighPass,
+        float LowPass,
+        float BandPass,
+        float BandPassQ,
+        float TremoloDepth,
+        float TremoloHz,
+        float Drive,
+        float RestScale,
+        float MotionScale,
+        float StepSeconds);
 }
diff --git a/state/evidence.jsonl b/state/evidence.jsonl
index 221e6ab..c7aaf6c 100644
--- a/state/evidence.jsonl
+++ b/state/evidence.jsonl
@@ -251,3 +251,4 @@
 {"date":"2026-05-31","area":"song-snippet-experiment-phases","lesson":"Three song-snippet phases across different segments improved best log-mel cosine from `0.308233` to `0.380805`, still pressure rather than close parity. Winning candidates converged on bright FM/formant `alien-lead` plus clocked high-band `dust-hat` noise and a continuous `codec-bed`/air layer; syrinx-heavy proposals scored worse. The durable DSL pressure is named scene-instrument sugar (`alien-lead-chatter`, `dust-hat-grid`, `codec-bed-hum`, `air-wash-hiss`) that lowers into explicit `param`, `curve interp=hold loop=true`, and `voice` records. Role sugar may own brevity/defaults; lowered controls remain DSP authority.","evidence":"artifacts/parity/song-snippet-swarms/20260531T014033022/experiment-report.md; artifacts/parity/song-snippet-swarms/20260531T014033022/song-trial-results.cc; docs/audio-doctrine.md; tools/run-song-snippet-trial-swarm.ps1"}
 {"date":"2026-05-31","area":"song-snippet-cultmesh-evidence","lesson":"Song-scene agents need target evidence as first-class database material, not loose analysis files. `song-prepare` now emits a log-mel spectrogram, per-band stats with first and second derivatives, RMS envelope, envelope autocorrelation, and an analysis report for every frozen clip; `song-score` upserts those artifacts as typed `SongChallengeEvidenceDocument` records in the `.cc` CultCache/CultMesh store, adds target metrics and `cultmesh://aquasynth/song-challenge-evidence/...` artifact URIs to every result, and indexes the evidence records into Qdrant-derived semantic chunks.","evidence":"src/AquaSynth.Core/IpaTrialResults.cs; tools/IpaTrialWorker/Program.cs; tools/run-song-snippet-trial-swarm.ps1; tests/AquaSynth.Dsl.Tests/IpaTrialOrchestratorTests.cs; artifacts/parity/song-snippet-smoke/cultmesh-evidence/index.md; artifacts/parity/song-snippet-smoke/cultmesh-evidence/search.md"}
 {"date":"2026-05-31","area":"song-snippet-album-swarm","lesson":"A 3-pass album swarm over random 30-second clips produced 15 scored trials and 15 full target evidence bundles in the shared `.cc` store. The agents improved from pass-001 best cosine `0.434277` to pass-002 best `0.590958`, then pass-003 best `0.502573`; aggregate mean cosine was `0.353315`, with 11 pressure verdicts and 4 weak verdicts. The strongest families converged on bright formant/vowel leads plus clocked dust/noise grids, while the semantic index successfully carried 90 bounded Qdrant chunks derived from full CultCache evidence docs.","evidence":"artifacts/parity/song-snippet-swarms/20260531T031003707/experiment-report.md; artifacts/parity/song-snippet-swarms/20260531T031003707/song-trial-results.cc; artifacts/parity/song-snippet-swarms/20260531T031003707/pass-003/vector-index-after.md; artifacts/parity/song-snippet-swarms/20260531T031003707/pass-003/semantic-search-after.md"}
+{"date":"2026-05-31","area":"song-scene-texture-owner","lesson":"The album-swarm patches exposed a bad scene-noise owner: agents modeled air/dust/recording condition with full-duration broad `wave=noise` voices, producing static white hiss that sounds like broken subtractive synthesis. The DSL now has `texture`/`noise_texture` sugar with role defaults for dust, air, codec, room, tape/vinyl; it lowers into a gated noise voice with bandpass/highpass/lowpass/tremolo shaping and an owned gate curve or pattern. Future song prompts require texture or an equivalently gated/band-shaped explicit voice for background noise.","evidence":"src/AquaSynth.Core/PatchScript.cs; tests/AquaSynth.Dsl.Tests/PatchScriptTests.cs; tools/run-song-snippet-trial-swarm.ps1; docs/audio-doctrine.md"}
diff --git a/state/scratch.md b/state/scratch.md
index de71347..4adc346 100644
--- a/state/scratch.md
+++ b/state/scratch.md
@@ -1744,3 +1744,8 @@ Next likely slice:
   0.502573. Best overall was
   `agent_04__shard_vowel_lead__bright_dust_grid_v2`; strongest repeated pattern
   is bright formant/vowel lead plus clocked dust/noise grid.
+- Listening correction: those clocked dust/noise grids still sit on persistent
+  broad white hiss. Added `texture`/`noise_texture` DSL sugar so air, dust,
+  codec, room, and tape/vinyl noise are owned as gated, band-shaped scene
+  roles. Future agents should not use full-duration raw `wave=noise` beds for
+  recording color.
diff --git a/tests/AquaSynth.Dsl.Tests/PatchScriptTests.cs b/tests/AquaSynth.Dsl.Tests/PatchScriptTests.cs
index 384835d..8f838a3 100644
--- a/tests/AquaSynth.Dsl.Tests/PatchScriptTests.cs
+++ b/tests/AquaSynth.Dsl.Tests/PatchScriptTests.cs
@@ -99,6 +99,31 @@ public sealed class PatchScriptTests
         Assert.Equal(622.254f, curve.Points[3].Value, 3);
     }
 
+    [Fact]
+    public void ParserSupportsShapedNoiseTextureSugar()
+    {
+        var patch = PatchScript.Parse("""
+            texture name=dust_hat role=dust pattern=x..x step=.125 gain=.12 sustain=30
+            texture name=air_wash role=air gain=.04 sustain=30
+            voice wave=saw freq=220 gain=.1
+            """);
+
+        Assert.Equal(3, patch.Voices.Count);
+        Assert.All(patch.Voices.Take(2), voice => Assert.Equal(Waveform.Noise, voice.Oscillator.Waveform));
+        Assert.Contains(patch.Parameters, parameter => parameter.Path == "/textures/dust_hat/gate");
+        Assert.Contains(patch.Parameters, parameter => parameter.Path == "/textures/air_wash/gate");
+        Assert.Contains(patch.ControlCurves, curve => curve.Name == "dust_hat_gate" && curve.Interpolation == ControlCurveInterpolation.Hold);
+        Assert.Contains(patch.ControlCurves, curve => curve.Name == "air_wash_gate_motion" && curve.Interpolation == ControlCurveInterpolation.Linear);
+        var dust = patch.Voices[0];
+        Assert.True(dust.Filter.BandPass > 0);
+        Assert.True(dust.Filter.BandPassQ > 1);
+        Assert.True(dust.Color.TremoloDepth > 0);
+
+        var faust = FaustEmitter.Emit(patch).Source;
+        Assert.Contains("fi.resonbp", faust);
+        Assert.Contains("/textures/dust_hat/gate", faust);
+    }
+
     [Fact]
     public void ParserSupportsVoiceVowelFrames()
     {
diff --git a/tools/run-song-snippet-trial-swarm.ps1 b/tools/run-song-snippet-trial-swarm.ps1
index 92447d2..92f4da1 100644
--- a/tools/run-song-snippet-trial-swarm.ps1
+++ b/tools/run-song-snippet-trial-swarm.ps1
@@ -278,6 +278,11 @@ Challenge:
 Goal:
 Write exactly one parseable AquaSynth `.aqua` patch that tries to reproduce the frozen $DurationSeconds second reference clip. This is scene-audio parity, not IPA articulation. You may use ordinary voices, FM, AM/tremolo, filters, formants, noise layers, acoustic vocal/syrinx primitives, curves, and helper voices.
 
+Noise and texture:
+- Do not model background or recording color as a full-duration raw `voice wave=noise` bed. That produces static white-noise wash and will be treated as broken subtractive synthesis, not scene modeling.
+- Use the shaped texture owner for noise roles: `texture name=dust_hat role=dust pattern=x..x step=<beat_seconds/4> gain=.08 sustain=$DurationSeconds`, `texture name=air_wash role=air gain=.035 sustain=$DurationSeconds`, `texture name=codec_bed role=codec gain=.04 sustain=$DurationSeconds`.
+- `texture` lowers to a gated noise voice with role-specific bandpass/highpass/lowpass/tremolo defaults and a control curve or pattern gate. Raw `voice wave=noise` is only acceptable for short transients with explicit gates and narrow filters.
+
 Rhythm and tempo:
 - The challenge report includes `tempo_bpm`, `beat_seconds`, and `tempo_confidence`, estimated from spectral/RMS onset autocorrelation.
 - The challenge report also points to `analysis_report`, `log_mel_spectrogram_csv`, `log_mel_band_stats_csv`, `rms_envelope_csv`, and `rms_envelope_autocorr_csv`; read them before writing the patch.
@@ -315,6 +320,7 @@ Evidence contract:
 - Write $agentDir/hypotheses.md with: reference features, cited analysis artifacts, tempo/rhythm plan, register/scale plan, scene voices, synthesis owners, invented instrument roles, expected metric movement, known risks.
 - Write exactly one `.aqua` file under $agentPatchDir named `<agent-id>__<family>__<hypothesis>.aqua`.
 - Include at least three scene voices or layers in the patch, such as primary alien-voice/body, rhythmic transient/noise, and background/recording color.
+- Background/recording-color layers must use `texture` or an equivalently gated and band-shaped explicit voice; a static full-duration white-noise bed is failed evidence.
 - Make the patch duration/gates cover the $DurationSeconds second target.
 
 Return a short final summary naming the patch and report.