Music and writing

Sometimes when I want to write something I use music to help me get in the mood for the scene I'm writing, and while I know that some people can only write if they are listening to their favorite songs, I try to write in silence. The reason I do this is because music can be distracting; I remember this time I was trying to write a particularly important scene for one of my older stories, but I couldn't get it right because the song I was listening to distracted me, and I couldn't get it right until I stopped listening to it.

Now, I'm not saying you should avoid all music, after all, as I said above, it's really helpful to get in the mood for a scene or two. The trick in my case is that I need to listen to the song before I actually try to write something.

Anyway, I've discovered that different types of music help for different kind of scenes or chapters; if I'm going to write action, I try to listen to rock or metal beforehand; if I want to write romance or drama, I try to listen to instrumental or classical music, and for horror I try to listen to scary movie soundtracks.

But if I ever had to chose one soundtrack to listen to that for me personally helps me get in the mood to write anything I want, then that would be the Conan soundtrack. Why? Well, let's just say that it's arguably the best motion picture soundtrack ever made, and I could listen to it forever.

If you've never listened to this masterpiece, I'll share it below, perhaps after that you'll be able to see why I say it's great to get in the mood to write about anything.