Does Music Help Fuel Your Writing?

B.D. Skunkworks

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It is said that music can influence alot about your mind. For me, it definitely gets my brain going; those creative juices flowing. Anyone have any songs/albums they listen to as they imagine potential scenes of their work? A fight scene, a conversation, or just a great set piece. The Book of Souls album by Iron Maiden basically serves as the soundtrack to my first manuscript, in particular the song The Great Unknown
Other musical influences on my writing included Daisuke Ishiwatari (composer of the Guilty Gear and Blazblue soundtracks) and Luca Turilli (currently listening to Zero Gravity: Rebirth and Evolution)
Anyone else feel the same?:e2headban
 

CJEvermore

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Sometimes, music can be a huge influence on my work. Alice Cooper's Brutal Planet was a massive influence on a lot of stuff I did, for instance. I'm also greatly inspired by the lyrics of bands like The Misfits, black metal bands, Ghost and many others. I would certainly be interested to read the manuscript based on Maiden's excellent Book of Souls album!

I don't tend to listen to music AS I'm writing, as I find it fairly distracting. But I certainly mull of plot ideas, characters and situations when I do blast out some tunes.
 

Kat M

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I've heard the gamut of opinions on this one, but for me yes. I've built up playlists on Spotify for each WIP. For me it's a specific genre and "feel" that matches the story. Since I write about musicians, often I use whatever style of music they play—but not always. So for my Celtic garage band story, everything is Celtic and moody; for my fiddle camp story I have a lot of old-time music but I picked some sad indie songs as well because they match the mood.
 

Maryn

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Not really for me, although I do play mood-appropriate music, no lyrics, if I need to cover a distracting level of sound. But most of the time my house is quiet, and even if I play music, after five minutes I don't even hear it, once I get in the groove.

Way cool music in the background is part of my imaginary Writer Self, who writes by a fire, is slimmer, and wears makeup for no earthly reason.

Maryn, who writes in PJs a good bit
 

Ari Meermans

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No, I'm one of those who need utter quiet to write; that's why I write in the wee morning hours when everyone else is asleep.

During the day, it's a completely different story—I have music playing constantly somewhere in the house as I go about my day. The music lends movement and energy to my tasks and I have a light dance playlist for making dinner. (Keeps me from becoming too flaccid in my old age, dontcha know :))
 

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Not for me. I require absolute silence so I can be alone with my thoughts. If I had music playing, I'd just start typing lyrics.
 

Enlightened

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For work that makes my mind wander (e.g. creating large databases of assets in Word or Excel), I like to listen to full albums on YouTube. Some tasks require ambient noise, so I load up a multi-hour jacuzzi bubbling video (that helps me with cadence of task).

When I write, never music. Always ambient sounds. My outlines are so detailed, there isn't much on-the-fly thinking to it (outside of dialogue). The ambient noise helps with this aspect.

The ambient sounds keep me on track.
 

Dan Rhys

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For me, it depends on the type of music and what I am writing. If it is something romantic, then some Gene Pitney tunes (I'm an old fashioned guy) will get that going in me because he echoes a lot of what I feel in the romantic sense, but if I am looking for outside-of-the box thinking, I will run something like Gene Clark's album No Other (especially "Strength of Strings"), which takes me soaring in the clouds and looking at situations in less conventional ways.
 

Will Collins

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Definitely. The majority of the time I have music on/headphones in whilst writing.
 

cool pop

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I can't listen to music while I write. Too distracting.
 

B.D. Skunkworks

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Lots of lovely opinions and viewpoints here; thanks for the responses. I may, however, have been slightly unclear when I asked "does music help fuel your writing?" I certainly didn't mean "do you listen to music while you write?" even I don't do that. I perhaps should have asked, "does music help inspire your writing?" Either way, it's good to see that music does indeed play a part in lots of your creative processes.
 
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Enlightened

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Lots of lovely opinions and viewpoints here; thanks for the responses. I may, however, have been slightly unclear when I asked "does music help fuel your writing?" I certainly didn't mean "do you listen to music while you write?" even I don't do that. I perhaps should have asked, "does music help inspire your writing?" Either way, it's good to see that music does indeed play a part in lots of your creative processes.

I think music can change a person's demeanor. For example, one may get an adrenaline rush and act a certain way listening to thrash metal (e.g. Metallica).

I typically don't listen to music to change my perception (to be able to write what a character feels). I may listen to classical music if I want to write an intellectual scene, which may alter my perception, to feel more in tune with writing the scene.
 

TellMeAStory

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It's silence that fuels my writing, and not just aural silence. For Thanksgiving, Hubby cooked something that involved boiling smoked turkey wings, and the odor--and I'm not talking "aroma" here--the odor knocked me right out of my brain space.

Later, his dish tasted fine, but honey, I'm not looking forward to a repeat.
 

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Nope, never. Music doesn't influence me period. At my age, I the only time I even listen to music, rarely, is in the car.
 

cool pop

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Lots of lovely opinions and viewpoints here; thanks for the responses. I may, however, have been slightly unclear when I asked "does music help fuel your writing?" I certainly didn't mean "do you listen to music while you write?" even I don't do that. I perhaps should have asked, "does music help inspire your writing?" Either way, it's good to see that music does indeed play a part in lots of your creative processes.

Yes, music does often inspire my writing along with things I see on TV, things in the news or just my own wandering thoughts. As for listening to music while writing, many people can do it and have no issues but for me it's distracting. I love music but I can't write with it.
 

B.D. Skunkworks

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Pretty good replies here, this thread is coming alive:Jump:. Out of curiosity, what kind of music per se is it that influences all of your thought processes? I myself am of the metal persuasion; i.e. Iron Maiden, Daisuke Ishiwatari, and Luca Turilli just to name a few.
 

Enlightened

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Pretty good replies here, this thread is coming alive:Jump:. Out of curiosity, what kind of music per se is it that influences all of your thought processes? I myself am of the metal persuasion; i.e. Iron Maiden, Daisuke Ishiwatari, and Luca Turilli just to name a few.

I don't think music can influence all thought processes. The brain is a complex thing. You have your reptilian brain, limbic, and neocortex components. There are voluntary and involuntary components the brain controls. There are analytic, creative, and mix of the two elements.

It's still demeanor vs. perception for me. I avoid using music to change my demeanor when writing; it limits you till the feeling passes.
 

ALShades

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I generally listen to soundtracks where the movie/music fits the scene i'm writing. The music in those are generally designed to elicit a certain vibe/feeling, so the right song can really help me zone in on the writing. The wrong song can throw me completely out of whack though.
 

Biffington

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I wish I understood how people could write while music is actively going on. It distracts me.

Before writing, I love to listen to music. I haven't tried too hard to get into different moods for writing with it, as things I write often have different characters feeling different ways at the same time. Poor communication is usually a central part of my stuff, and I try to keep my writing style consistent between chapters.