What music do you listen to when you write? (If you do that is.)
Whatever I've been listening to a lot lately, whatever I know pretty well where I won't be picking out guitar riffs or lyrics instead of writing.
Lately, The Best of Fred Neil, the first Duran Duran record, Tubeway Army - Replicas, Morphine - Good. That's it mostly. No metal usually, too hard to type while headbanging.
I can't and wish I could. It distracts me. I'm a (hack) musician and it's my passion. So I feel like I really need to listen. And then I get distracted from the work and then the music. Or I play a record and I think afterwards, "I never heard that record."
I collect vinyl and have two record players in my house. I try to pick up jazz & instrumental albums so I can play them while I write and while I work (my day job has me working out of my house for the most part). But like I said, I find it mostly distracting.
I do feel like I need to give it more of a shot though as it combines some of my favorite things. Though I have to do instrumental, lyrics will throw me off too much.
And if I may make a suggestion in this space, make sure you all check out the Budos Band. It's some serious funk - almost 70s cop funk - and maybe that's a head space you'll want to be in from time to time. They are damn nasty!
I'm gonna look up that band right now.
I usually listen to instrumentals. Lyrics usually distract me, not all the time. I find that listening to music gets more emotions out of me and sets the tone for whatever I'm writing.
Most of the time it has to relate to what I'm doing.
THIS IS AMAZING!
Yall should check out Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings, also on the Desco/Daptones record label that's the best modern funk/afrobeat lately. Them and Soul Fire (another split from Desco.) (Obligatory funk nerdism follows)
Renfield... you just led me to a gold mine of music I never knew the name of.
I've always loved this sound.
It reminds me a lot of cop films/shows and blaxploitation films.
I have to listen to classical if anything at all. I can't stand having people speak while I'm typing. I have a very bad habit of eve's dropping (Not sure if that is the right spelling) and I start typing responses to their conversations. Things I would say and see if I get it right. Basically, I turn Starbucks into my own personal Mystery Science Theatre 3000k.
Hahaha I never though I'd see Mystery Science Theatre referenced. I love that series.
Same here. I seriously can't concentrate with people talking.
I usually listen to Beethoven or film composers.
I can't even do film composers I start thinking of quotes from the movies and it just goes South from there. Classical is even hit and miss. I mean most of us did grow up with Bugs Bunny and friends and you know the rest.
I know what you mean. Sometimes I think of this.
I listen to everything from Budos Band to Glenn Gould to (old) Metallica to new Robert Plant (Band of Joy) to K-Drea Super Sounds of the 70's (Gerry Rafferty, bitches), Charlie Winston, Buck 65, Leonard Cohen, Martha Wainwright, Piaf, Pink Floyd (meddle!) to Wu Tang and Public Enemy, so yeah, I'm musically spastic. I really prefer jazz in the background when I'm writing and always look for carpal tunnel avoidance breaks via Davis, Brubeck, Mingus et al. A good radio station like Radio Paradise online or in Canada CBC Radio 2 Tonic seem to coincide with writerly hours. Yerm ...
Very nice selection Drea. I usually put on Pandora or Last.fm.
I actually kinda prefer lyrical music over instrumental. As long as I know/don't care about the words, it's fun to follow the vocal melody and keep that cadence in my typing (I'm a hideously slow typer normally, a bit faster with the background noise.) That and pre-writing, there's a lot of singer-songwriters that I admire and want to rip off a bit of their syntax or their imagery. Like what Bradbury says about devouring poetry to keep your writing fresh, songwriting is basically new poetry.
The chick from Slant 6 I've kind of subtly been ripping off lately, can't tell you why.
I run a box fan in the room. That's about the only noise I can stand.
I like the sound.
I couldn't even listen to a box fan.
This thread is full of the win since I've last checked in.
I have to do a review of a show I went to last Saturday - Charles Bradley (another daptone guy) you should all check out. Though you can't write to that. You can only get down.
But I have a King Curtis album that needs some spinning tonight. This is a good problem to have.
I find it hard to write to noise in general, at least the first time through a story. But on the second or third sweep, when I'm adding the flavor, I (sometimes) like a soundtrack, and generally go with music that matches the tone of what I'm writing. It can give a scene an almost cinematic feel, and better help me picture how it would play out.
I plug the computer into my bass-heavy 7-speaker stereo system, set MediaPlayer on a random course, turn on the sub-woofer and set the equalizers to no-treble, no mid-range, bass-only, turn the volume way down, and then write with a bass-and-beat-only rumble. This transforms most all old familiars into a mysterious atmospheric background soundtrack...
(I too find lyrics and talking distracting...)
When I'm trying to get shit done, not necessarily just writing, but also art, cleaning, general motivation, etc, I listen to a lot of Dirty Three (mostly instrumental, also office friendly) and used to basically just play Joy Division on repeat. For some reason that stuff just makes me get shit done.
The magic fire musik by Jackie-O Motherfucker
Dirty three / Mogwai / Yuck / Deafcenter / GYBE / Waits / Sonic Youth / Sun Ra etc..........
This kept playing in my head while writing some flash starring the devil & Co:
<iframe width="400" height="100" style="position: relative; display: block; width: 400px; height: 100px;" src="http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/v=2/track=27208748/size=venti/bgcol=FFFFFF/linkcol=4285BB/" allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0"><a href="http://dusttodigital.bandcamp.com/track/satan-your-kingdom-must-come-down">Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down by Sister Fleeta Mitchell and Rev. Willie Mae Eberhart</a></iframe>
ai doesn't work.....
http://dusttodigital.bandcamp.com/track/satan-your-kingdom-must-come-down
I like the link. I was afraid of clicking it first because of the name haha.
@deheerbill, you would probably appreciate Trentmoeller if you like the Mogwai, etc.
@drea
Trentemoeller / nice / thank you!
Oh, and since today: David Lynch - Crazy Clown Time
It depends on what I am writing. For the most part everything from Progressive Bluegrass (Crooked Still) to Black and Metalcore, Metal (Parkway Drive, August Burns Red, Lamb of God)
I try to find things that fit whatever I am writing.
Ill even throw Trance (Above and Beyond, Armin) in for good measure, non-liniar music normally does it.
