Many authors need quiet to get work done. I’m not one of those. I need some type of noise, but one that I can control. I can mute my laptop whenever I need to focus more. I can’t do that to other people no matter how hard I hit the remote button or how many things I throw. This has been an issue since my childhood. There’s always been a problem with people talking to me while I’m writing. It goes like this:
- I’m writing on laptop or in notebook. Focused on my thoughts.
- Someone walks up talking as if I’m just sitting there waiting for attention.
- I give a look or say ‘working’.
- They apologize and either go away or keep talking.
- Both situations result in me getting a little derailed.
This is if I’m even the target of the conversation. When my wife and dad were around the house and I was working in the dining room, they had conversations in the same room. It was like people were gravitating toward me even if I wasn’t involved. So the music acts as a deterrent since it makes it hard for people to talk around me or to me. They need to get through Weird Al, Tantric, Theory of a Deadman, Linkin Park, Queen, Seether, Shinedown, Disturbed, Black Sabbath, and whatever else has crept onto my Pandora station. The downside here is that things seem to just pop up after a week because they’re connecting to something else. So it isn’t a perfect system. Also I don’t always realize when Pandora has stopped to ask if I’m still there, which gives people an opening.
So, is there anything you do that goes against the ‘majority’ of authors?
Legends of Windemere 
Sounds like you’re setting up a nice minefield of music around you… Good tip! Sadly, I prefer quiet when I work, or some classical music if it can’t be helped (say because Electra’s working on her own desk, a few yards away, and wants some music).
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I really wonder why I can’t write in quiet. I guess I’ve had music playing while I work for so long that it’s become a necessity. Interesting how we unknowingly train ourselves to need certain things in our environment that others would find a distraction.
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Let’s see…daydream, write in silence, drink, fail to exercise, blog about my projects, whine about sales… Nope, pretty typical.
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That exercise one is a killer. Taken me a while, but I finally pulled off a full week of daily stationary biking. If only I could write while on the dang thing.
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Well, there are treadmill desks. Maybe get an easel or music stand, prop your laptop or tablet up there?
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I considered it, but the constant motion makes my handwriting/typing very shaky. I’m amazed by anyone who can move and write at the same time. Best I can do is think, bike, and not fall off at the same time. 🙂
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Silence is golden. I get distracted even when my granddaughter is quietly playing a game on the iPad. Just having someone else in the room is a distraction.
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Silence is definitely golden at times. Other times I find it rather suspicious. 😉
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I do music. I put on Iheart radio and program uninterrupted the genre I want to hear that day.
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I totally forgot about Iheart radio. How often do you change genres?
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About every two days or so
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I book mark the spots and then can simply go back into my favorites to retrieve the line up
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Very cool. What’s the genre for today?
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80’s rock
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Excellent. 🙂
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Music is a must!
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🙂
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I used Pandora for around 3 years, but in the last few months, I switched to Spotify. After having Pandora for so long, there are benefits to Spotify’s set-up that Pandora lacks (such as being able to find and play a song instantly instead of waiting for it to show up on the radio, also getting to listen to complete albums).
However, as a writer who uses music as an influence, Pandora has the quality of being in-the-moment and sporadic; so sometimes songs come up that wouldn’t otherwise have been played and consequently, change the mood of the writing that might not have occurred otherwise. Though placing Spotify’s library on shuffle tends to create a Pandora-like effect beyond the metrics of genre that Pandora offers.
Either way, like tpolen said; Music is a must!
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I don’t really go hunting for specific songs, which is probably one of the reasons I never switched. The few times I do, I just turn on my Youtube playlist. Though it’s probably more that I’m just too lazy to do the switch.
The funny thing about the randomness of Pandora is that it can be surprisingly on target when I’m writing. For example, there was an action scene I wrote and it ended up playing Final Fantasy battle music for some reason.
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I’ve noticed that about Pandora too. Sometimes, it can be startling accurate to what is being written. I guess when I mentioned that it plays unexpected things, I was thinking of those times where it chose a song that increased the depth of the scene or character’s pov that might not have occurred without the triggering audio. That’s the fun of spontaneous music, for sure. 🙂
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Definitely. Though I do wish it would stop adding strange songs to my playlists. Not sure how it does the expansion.
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noise doesn’t ever bother me, its interuptions that frustrate me. I like music on sometimes, rock and metal or classical (you have some similar tastes to mine in your catalogue). I have a nice selection of cds(over 600) and my personal faves for writing to are the movie soundtracks. Ones like lord of the rings/hobbit, gladiator, anything with a variety of atmospheric sounds really gets the creative juices flowing. good post 🙂
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Good choices. I wonder if the noise situation is more about control than volume. If one has the power to mute or change the music then it’s easier to handle. Yet a family member walking in to talk about the price of milk isn’t something you can control. So it has a lot more negative impact.
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This is something we authors do to ourselves. Thinking there is Only One Right Way to work. I disagree. If metal music is what you need to create the mood or in this case maintain your workspace, then keep doing that. What other writers do is secondary.
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It is funny how we speak as if there’s a set of rules for this thing. Look back at popular/famous authors and you’ll find a lot of quirks.
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