Does anybody else listen to music while they write?

[Weave]

Whether it be spontaneously scribbling something new and interesting on a piece of paper or typing up an excerpt on the existentialism of Dwarves, I tend to find I write better with some themed music behind me. It can't have lyrics, though; listening to the words as I write words has always been a poor mix with me, and I can never seem to tune it out. Personally, I prefer orchestrated music and movie soundtracks, often picking a song that suits what I feel I'm about to write. This may just be a feature of how I work: I always picture things in my head as scenes and pictures, using writing as a medium to eke out some sort of translation between the two. Having a soundtrack playing behind my scene just deepens the atmosphere for me.

So how about you folks, do you listen to any music as you write? If so, what kind? Am I the anomaly here?

[Hibou]

Movie soundtracks work well; however I've taken a liking recently to listening to the online radio station Mission Control when doing homework at school and it seems to work very well for setting writing as well. I've started listening to a lot of new music because of it, and it's all stuff that really relaxes and focuses you for writing. I highly recommend Mission Control and any other radio stations with ambient/space-themed music you can get your hands on; I find it makes it very easy to find tracks that you'd like to be on the soundtrack to your setting.

[Seraph]

Yeah, i often like to have some king of music.  Lyrics are a no, mostly since I often feel the urge to sing along, or at least listen in and jam out too much.  

[Steerpike]

Less when I write for pleasure, but I've written papers with Massive Attack or Daft Punk on repeat.

[Drizztrocks]

Yes! It doesn't really matter what it is to me, but I love native american flute music so much, and since there is no words, it goes perfectly. Something about my mind keeps me from focusing on one thing very well, so it's almost like the music playing is distracting my subconsious and clearing my mind of thoughts, allowing me to think clearly and write much better. It also blocks out all the distractions around me, which is a bonus.

[Mason]

Chopins stuff seems to work really well for me. Op.9 is probably one of the most beautiful pieces of music for piano I have ever heard. I must agree, music with words tends to throw me off when I try to write. Classical and a lot of the  Windham Hill stuff works well for me.  

[Weave]

Ahh, I love Windham Hill! When in the mood to write more "epic" things, Corner Stone Cues Orchestra never leads me astray.

Glad to see a fair amount of other people who enjoy music to their writing! My only other GM friend says he prefers to write in silence, which I found both eerie and unique given my own personal tastes.

[SDragon]

Here, music is playing often enough that it's improbable for me to write without listening to it. I generally don't have it playing for the express purpose of writing, but it's still there. When I'm drawing, on the other hand, I feel I work best when something's playing. I wouldn't always say it inspires me, but it does seem to encourage me creatively.

[LD]

Re: Listen; usually the musical inspirations that I listen to are listed in the particular setting I am writing, but unlike the above posters I enjoy listening to hip hop, pop, or alternative music for inspiration when writing or reading- the wider the variety the better. The main rules for my music are this however: Happy songs (positive lyrics, happy sounding singer/voice/instruments, positive beat/sound (For example: a rap song about killing thugs is good if it has an upbeat), or sarcastic... at least one of the above.

In contrast, I rarely hear songs that in all aspects are designed to make the listener feel sorrow or regret.

Listening to "rich" music focuses me better on a task as I strive to concentrate and the music blocks out distracting thoughts; or it provides me inspiration for a task.

[Gamer Printshop]

The same as when I create art or cartography, when I write I prefer silence. There's already loud music in my head, no need to distract that with sounds in the environment around me. I get distracted when there's noise or music around me. I guess I'm odd that way.

GP

[Kindling]

As a musician, I think that in a way I'm almost too "into" music to write to it. I'd end up focussing on listening rather than writing. However, I think that by the same token maybe some ambient or drone stuff might work well as it's more formless and atmospheric, so maybe I should give that a go sometime and see how it affects my output... But at the moment, yeah, I usual write without a soundtrack.

[Mason]

Maybe we should encourage an exercise, wherein the participants alternate creative-writing/drawing/cartograph(ing?)(y?) while listening to music and then not.

 Also, an exercise in which one listens to music that:

 A: Has lyrics/no lyrics.
 B: Is something you would not normally listen to.
 C: Is something you would absolutely never listen to.

 Just a thought. I'm always fascinated by these sorts of things.

[Superfluous Crow]

I rarely put music on just to get in the mood for writing.
On the other hand, I have music in the background most of the time. Unless there's a tv on. I'm pretty used to multitasking most of the time, for better and for worse... Doesn't really matter what kind of music it is, I often just put my entire playlist on shuffle (and it consists of everything from metal over singer-songwriters to pop and rock).
The lyrics don't bother me, but then again, I don't really have anything without lyrics. Except for a few classical James Bond songs. But I should probably look into some classical music at some point.

Also, LD, we seem to have similar taste in some ways! Maybe with less thugs in my end, though. :p

 

[Ninja D!]

Music is a fairly big part of my life. I will often be inspired by songs and there will usually be music playing somewhere when I write. I do not turn music on for the purpose of writing, though.

[SamuraiChicken]

I find that I frequently listen to music while I work on projects. When I brainstorm or hit a lull in inspiration, the music provides some nice background music (similar to when you get put on hold). When I get a great idea and start to write it down (or in other cases when I put all my focus into a project) I find that I hardly ever 'hear' the music in the background, even though I know it's there.

Sometimes the music provides inspiration or helps me develop ideas better if the music is similar to what theme or genre I have in mind. The problem is that I have a wide taste in music, so the chances of a song matching the theme/genre of what I'm writing about is pretty small simply due to my habit of listening to my entire musical collection on random (and when I say I have a wide musical selection, I mean it).

As for the words/no words aspect, I find that I have slightly more non-lyric songs than songs with lyrics, but I happen to be one of those people who hardly pays attention to what the lyrics in a song are anyways. To me, the human voice is simply an additional instrument to the song, and if it sounds nice, I like the song. If the voice doesn't sound very good, or doesn't match with the rest of the instruments very well, then I don't like the song. This is why I don't mind listening to songs sung in languages that I don't know. In fact, the number of songs in my collection with non-English lyrics that I have outnumber the songs with English lyrics.