I almost always use music. I've posted this link before, but I'll post it again. This mix has helped fuel some of my best work. I'm currently writing a sci-fi post-apo story, so the music sets the mood. Only one song in the entire video has lyrics (go to 2:53:57 to hear it) and although I sometimes find words distracting, its one of my favorites. I really want to know what it's from!
Yes I have slowly begun to do this as well - Project Z now has a list of about twelve songs that usually end up on shuffle and repeat lol But yes it does seem to be an important aspect for many people when it comes to setting the mood of the story. I find that fascinating. And in preparation for working on Chapter 3 of Project Z here is the song which is currently setting the mood. Anilah (feat. Einar from Wardruna) - Warrior
I find lyrics okay as long as they meld well into the background, like in the song of just posted a moment ago. I find powerful or fast and rhythmic beats far more distracting even though that is the music I will often listen too when I am not writing. The mood needs to be subtle I find.
While I write to music, I tend to crank it up to a good 70-80Db. Can range and vary wildly by genre and tone, but yes always. Lyrics or not, doesn't matter to me.
Yeah music can help. Foreign lyrics or instrumental as has been said. If it has words I can understand in it then they just distract me too much.
I can't listen to music while I write. Any rhythm it has will screw up the rhythms of my sentences and paragraphs. It's just endlessly annoying and distracting.
Not a friggin' chance. I'm a musician. I cannot listen to music passively. If I hear music I am constantly analyzing it, figuring out how it is played, what are the techniques involved, etc. etc. Just a distraction to me.
Everyone has their own style, but yes if you are distracted to the point of analysis on every song - then music is probably best left out of the writing space for you. I can understand why- if I am doing something that requires a lot of thought for example, the music tends to get turned way down or off for those periods.
Not bothered either way. I usually tend to write to either classic music (mainly Mozart or Beethoven) or Celtic instrumental music which can certainly help to concentrate.
I love music and at the same time writing is my passion. But i did not try to write a music track or song.
I often enjoy listening to music. It's relaxing, yet strangely the music fades while I'm writing and I seems to gradually retune into it again periodically.
I usually listen to The Moody Blues while writing. I saw another post on here where the writer wrote that he is a musician and cannot listen to music passively so he finds it distracting while writing. I'm a musician as well but for me, it is not distracting, I can listen to music both actively or passively, and have spent countless hours laying on the floor, lights off, listening to music, to every instrument being played and how it is mixed with the rest of the instruments. But I also have music on in the background. Maybe because it covers the sound of the occasional car/bus driving along the street, horn being honked, or walking vender yelling "aguacate!" from the street. If only I could hear the waves of the sea rolling up onto the beach, but alas, I live a block from the beach and cannot hear those natural sounds. Using artificial sounds/recordings? No thanks.
I prefer writing in silence. I use my tablet to both write and listen to music when the time comes for whichever so I can't really play music while I write for the time being. Though I'd be interested in trying it because I really only listen to post-rock and I imagine there being no better genre for creativity. All is personal opinion of course.
Tried it once and I found it just got on my nerves. Also, playing music is difficult i my house since I have a dog who thinks she an opera singer and when she hears music she starts to howl. If it's rock music she barks. She's incredibly versatile.
"incredibly versatile"? Seriously? A dog barking is the most annoying sound ever, especially when writing. It is beyond my comprehension how anybody can stand to listen to that noise. As you may have noticed, I'm not a dog-friendly person. As you will probably say - to each his own. You love dogs, I don't, this is the kind of stuff that makes the world interesting, and not boring.
Is your sole purpose in life to hate dogs? Cosmic Lights was joking about her dog's musical versatility.
Wow, lighten up. It's my opinion, just as you have opinions as well. Opinions are like ass holes - everyone has one, and they all stink.
Mod hat on here: Okay, guys, let the 'dog love/hate' issue subside before it gathers more steam, please. We need to get back to the original theme of this thread. Which is: Writing to Music.
I'm always listening to music, mostly instrumentals as they tend to fuel my imagination more so than anything. Sometimes it's a little distracting though, but so is total silence when you have a mind that goes 100 miles an hour. When I'm writing a scene, I tend to put on a piece that matches what I'm going for, like for a sad tone, I put on sad sounding music like one of Within Temptations songs, or a sad sounding instrumental song I find on Youtube. Once I even had a song on repeat when writing out a scene. It worked for a while, but then I got annoyed with the song before I could finish writing the scene.
