For me it depends on what I'm trying to write.. I'll listen to my Mp3 player on shuffle while I'm writing, but if I start having trouble with a scene or getting into a mood or some such I'll throw together a playlist for it... Always lyrical. I can usually tune out the words enough that they don't bother me.
Right now I have John Barrowman on a loop lol What About Us, All Out of Love, Bad Romance by Lady Gaga (but with the youtube Barrowmance video) and the Tom Cruise thing he did for Children in Need. I am heartily sick of it but am finding second book is less inspired without it for whatever reason so now have added David Tennant shaking his fist shouting 'BARROWMAN!!!!' and I join in lol I suspect I will never listen to this collection again once book is finished. Normally Michael Ball and a mix do it for me.
As for what I actually listen to: it's usually symphonic/operatic metal. Lyrics only distract me if I'm not "in the zone" but if I am, then I eventually stop hearing the music and just write. It doesn't even seem to matter if the mood of the music fits the mood of the writing, but if I go without music, then I'm more likely to get distracted. There have also been plenty of times where I got stuck trying to figure out how to write a certain scene, only to become conscious of the music again and somehow the music inspires the scene and gets me unstuck.
The things I listen to most when doing major writing are the "Final Fantasy" soundtracks, music by Enya, "Riverdance" / "Lord of the Dance" soundtracks and occasionally Apocalyptica, for those intense battle scenes.
I've recently been listening to the Inception soundtrack ... a lot. Otherwise I'm listening to symphonic / gothic metal.
Well, I usually listen to classic music like Chopin and Japanese instrumental songs. Sometimes I listen to songs with singers like Jeff Buckley, Radiohead and The Gazette....... But that just happens when i´m under odd circunstances, cause usually those type of songs just interrupt all of my thoughts, when i´m trying to review or write something.
Music is extremely distractive. D: I can't focus on anything I'm writing. Music is sometimes the source of my ideas though.
Actually no. I don't listen to music when I write. It's too distracting. I am heavily inspired by music, I do some of my best brainstorming listening to music, and all my projects have their own playlists depending on what I feel like mulling over. I even organize them by plot events and mood. My stories are usually really long mixes but my characters tend to be more one specific band or album. Bones is The Veils album Nux Vomica, for example. My characters tend to have wildly differing personalities, as my stories are mostly character driven, sorting out playlist really helps me keep them straight and from sounding just like... me talking at myself. And with that marvellous wall of text, I leave you.
I listen to whatever I need to pull inspiration from. Whatever fits my mood. When I'm writing about a character, I usually have a certain person in mind that helps me visualize and capture their personality. Same with music. When I'm trying to express them and let them have some 'deep insight', I'll play some good classical music or some piano pieces.
I've been writing horror lately, and during the more distressing passages I've been listening to various black and death metal bands. Seems to fit the hellish atmospheres I've been working on. For sci-fi I tend to veer more towards Prog-rock and ambient.
I really love listening to music when writing. For most of my stuff, I either listen to stuff with no words, such as Ratatat, or with barely audible words, such as Black Moth Super Rainbow. Or I'll listen to any music that I know all the words to, like The Postal Service's album Give Up or Paramore's album Brand New Eyes. :]
I don't listen to music, because it's too much of a distraction to me, except when certain song are the inspiration to my writing.
I've recently discovered that Mozart's Clarinet Concerto in A Major is great for writing. It really relaxes my mind and helps my ideas form an orderly queue in my head rather than all rush out at once. It's a shame it's only 30 mins long though.
I like to listen to the sound of silence. As in, I put earplugs in my ears. Before I write, I like to listen to music though. But it's always pretty random-whatever I feel like at the time.
I usually can listen to anything without lyrics like soundtracks or certain classical tracks, although at times it can be distracting so it gets turned off from time to time. I did find that a good way to compile tracks like this is to do a You Tube play list of assorted music, it allows you to have a great number of tracks without having to pay ten thousand dollars for CD's or on I-Tunes.
Music definitely inspires my writing but I never actually listen to music during the act of writing as I want one hundred percent focus on my work. OST's for movies and games are of the greatest value to me. Often in fact, I'll immediately attach a song I hear from a movie to a particular event in my story. I don't even have to think about it. The first time I watched Avatar and Inception for example I knew precisely what events in my story particular songs were scored for. These songs quickly become so ingrained in my mind that sometimes I can no longer put them in context of the original source.
it depends for me, right now I have "I'm going down" by Springsteen playing on my I tunes...sometimes its Eminem, other times Queen, AC/DC, Star Trek III and II soundtracks...it just depends on my mood that day.
Over the years, I have found that background music can be very inspirational for me. I specifically say background, because if I actively listen to it, I'm getting into the music and not writing. When the music is a subtle influence in the background, it becomes mood music. Sound connects with many people on an emotional level and that combination of emotional connection and mood setting influence has done wonders to inspire me. The trick is finding the right music to become your muse. When I'm writing a swords and sorcery tale, of men in armor, battling supernatural creatures upon a mythological battlefield lost to the ages I like the bold, hard, operatic sounds of Basil Poledouris from the "Conan the Barbarian" motion picture soundtrack. The thundering kettle drums, symphonic forlorn brass horns and incidental chorus singing in ancient latin combine to emotionally inspire the proper mood and feeling of ancient lands, dire monsters, supernatural magics and mighty men in armor fighting for their lives. When I'm writing a science fiction piece, with giant robots and armored space marines with laser rifles, I tend to prefer to listen to a mix of Techno and Heavy Metal music. Judas Priest gives a good hard core, bad ass vibe, while techno dance music is great for fast paced, high tech inspiration. When I'm writing a gothic horror story, say, for example, a tale of a vampires in classical europe, I've discovered that the music of E Nomine suits the bill perfectly. The song "Das Omen", for example, is a blend of techno and hard rock music, with the goth lyrics sang in the German language, with the back up vocals singing in Catholic Latin verse, combine to create the perfect supernatural, creepy gothic background music, with the proper other worldly, higher dimensional feelings of a "wrath of god" type vibe. I find it very inspiring for writing vampire and undead stories. My opinion was later underscored when I saw the video on utube, with sexy goth chicks abducting a catholic priest, forcing him to drink a mixture of blood and worms from a golden chalice and ultimately turning him into a vampire. Yeah, they definitely have the "Darker side of evil" thing down to a science.
I have to have mood music for everything, lol. Homework, surfing the inter-webs, writing, sex, and sleeping. I make soundtracks for my stories and make play lists out of them. I even write stories based off of songs! Inspired BY songs. Example: Special Needs by Placebo. You hear the song and just picture a story going down in your head, so you write it. Running Up That Hill, by Placebo. Running to the Edge of the World, by Marilyn Manson. The Only Exception, by Paramore. They all have their own stories. =)
Music that inspires you So far i havent written anything yet because of a song, but most often it will set a certain mood and ideas and images slowly infiltrate my mind. And even sometimes i will create music video in my head for the song that is playing. For my case its mostly either indy music or something really slow and experimentale like ambiant or trip hop. I am wondering what kind of music inspires you either to have ideas or set a certain tone when you write.
Often certain songs do motivate me to write, however, I cant listen to songs while writing, instead I tend to just play soundtracks, for example, the Transformers soundtrack (2007) seems to help alot
