Plot Bunnies and Ear Worms
This post is just a cheap excuse to blog about music on my author blog :D But come on, who doesn't like discovering new music?
I tend to pick out one or two songs as inspiration points for each major piece of writing I'm working on. This goes beyond just "setting the mood"; I'll pace in front of my desk, imagining the characters and mentally setting little movie trailers of the story to the music blasting away on my earphones. Some of the most important scenes in my books are developed this way.
I don't really have a process for picking a song. I always seem to find them by accident, just over the course of surfing Last.fm or playing with Spotify. But then again, writing a book takes a lot of time ... so odds are I'll find something that clicks eventually.
Anyway, in the interests of fangirling over bands most people have never heard of (and some people have but for the wrong reasons *sigh*) ... here's my list. All song links are to Soundcloud unless otherwise specified.
Songs for Completed Projects
Split Self
I found Smith & Pyle's Slippery Hips (Spotify) through the now defunct Popcharts (*sob* ALL MY FAVORITE INDIE MUSIC SITES ARE GONE~~) and as soon as I heard it I was amazed at how perfectly it fit Lily and Clare's relationship (Lily's a guy BTW ... I have to say that so often now I feel like that should be the official subtitle of Split Self >.<). It's a fantastically DIRTY song that they get away with because they're two cute girls.
Also on rotation were Theoretical Girl's Red Mist (the demo version is a thousand times better than the official release), and The Generationals' Nobody Could Change Your Mind was on endless repeat when I was writing the silent disco scene.
The Destructibles
For some reason nothing got me more in the mood for this Orwellian style dystopia better than Beirut's Elephant Gun which sounds a bit like it should be playing on a carousel. This introduced me to Beirut and their music has a richness and complexity that makes it easy to write to.
Guttersnipe
As much as I'd hate to ruin my indie street cred by admitting this ... I wrote most of Guttersnipe to Florence + The Machine's What the Water Gave Me (Spotify). It had just the right fit: moody, mercurial, but at the end released and reborn. I hate how Florence + The Machine is tied to Eat, Pray, Love and branded like some kind of Enya-for-the-Lady-Gaga-Generation when in reality her songs are dark, violent, and sarcastic. Sure Dog Days is uplifting ... but listen to the lyrics of The Girl with One Eye or Kiss with a Fist.
Also for some reason while I was writing Guttersnipe I went on a bit of a Vivaldi kick *lol* ... make of that what you will. And while editing it I developed a thing for Shona Foster's No. 34. The lyrics are a bit too romantic and nostalgic, but the melody itself fit what I wanted the reading experience to feel like.
How To Quit Playing Hockey
Oddly enough I don't think I really had anything specific for this one. I was listening to my playlist's for HBO 24/7's Winter Classic specials pretty much non-stop though and that may have been why. Nothing better for hockey slash than hockey soundtracks. Favorite tracks: The Black Key's Lonely Boy, Mutemath's Blood Pressure, Popstrangers' Happy Accidents, and Malajube's Montreal -40*C
Songs for Current Projects
The Condor
Why is BDSM always so angsty and depressing? D: Is there anything sillier than a guy in black leather futzing around with medieval dungeon equipment? No, I think not. For this semi-sweet, semi-sarcastic kinky sex romp I use a lot of glam-rock-inspired indie favorites like OK Go's WTF? and Jet's aptly titled Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is (Spotify)
The Freelancers (part one)
Oh my little erotic M/M spy+crime opus. Will I ever figure out how to publish you? O.o Will I ever finish revising you? Probably not ... for the time being I listen to Duels' Regeneration, The Kill's Satellite (Spotify), and Spoon's Written in Reverse.
The Freelancers (part two)
Just drafting at this point, but this book is much more Yuri focused. Beirut's The Gulag Orkestar is basically Yuri's song in my head.
Season in the Red
This reboot of my first webserial is going to hold me up creatively until I finally finish it. It haunts me, it has a cult following that asks me about it ALL THE TIME *lol* Anyway, I'm redeveloping it into a series of novellas and trying to fix the worst of the structural problems with it (ugh) If I'm able to do that this summer I will be EXTREMELY happy.
Anyway, for these "secret life of men" locker room tales The Fratellis's My Friend John (Spotify) (*lol* There's more to The Fratellis than Chelsea Dagger!) and Leningrad's Kopeyka(Spotify) (Russian ska music is the best~~) were always cued up.
Songs for Developing Projects
Protopolis
This has been a very strange book for me musically so far. I'm hoping to finish up the revisions on part one of The Freelancers and get back to working on this more regularly again. I started off with some very hard Chevelle with Mexican Sun (Spotify) and Humanoid (Spotify) but as the first part of the book is told from the perspective of a shallow 16 year old girl I've since slipped into things like Laura Veirs's Salvage a Smile (Spotify) and The Asteriod Galaxy Tour's Out of Frequency (Spotify) ... sometimes I split the difference and listen to Evans Blue's Caught a Lite Sneeze (Spotify) (hard rock cover of Tori Amos? YES PLEASE!)
Reversal
Most of the time what determines which projects get worked on when is the likelihood that I can figure out a way to publish them when I'm done. There's absolutely nothing worse than finishing a book only to have to put it on the shelf because it doesn't fit what publishers want and you don't have the resources (or energy) to self-pub it. You end up coming back to it months later and only seeing its problems then getting lured into rewriting most of it (*cough* The Freelancers >.<)
So Reversal is going to happen ... I'm just not sure when, because Reversal is so much a red haired stepchild of M/M Romance it makes Guttersnipe look like a perfect fit for the genre. It's moody, about the futility of regrets, and written in second person (AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA~~) This is one of those books that you publish when you're crazy famous and people will let you get away with anything.
My songs for it are Arcade Fire's Rebellion (Lies) (Spotify) and The Rural Alberta Advantage's Frank, AB which I picked up because it was used in the trailer for the AWESOME French documentary that inspired part of Reversal's plot (I Believe I Can Fly (Flight of the Frenchies), watch it NOW ... your mirror neurons will thank you)
A Remarkable Creature
It's strange to have songs for a story I have not written a word of yet but ... hahah, whatever. I'm pretty sure this idea will survive because I have always wanted to try writing STEAMPUNK! :D Set in Paris between the Expositions (World's Fair) of 1889 and 1900 it will have some BDSM overtones but probably not erotic. Primarily a vehicle for all this pent up angst I have regarding being a woman working in an industry with a sexist frat house mentality. My songs for it are Peggy Sue's D.U.M.B.O and The Pierce's Love You More
Songs for Projects in Limbo
Girls on Top
My contract with the publisher committed to this project was terminated a few months ago after they decided not to pay me or provide me with accurate sales reports. So I'm not sure what will happen with this. Probably just as well to scrap it altogether, since it was a Gossip Girl style take on the world of startups. Being that my day job has since shifted from working primarily with publishers to working primarily with startups ... moving forward with such a book might not be so *cough* politically expedient? ^_^;;;; But I always did like the playlist I had for it which included lots of BRMC, La Roux's Tigerlily, Emily Wells's Symphony 8 & the Carnary's Last Take (Spotify), Little Barrie's Pin That Badge, and Soul Coughing's Super Bon Bon (Spotify)
....so what about you guys? If you write, what do you listen to while you're writing?
I tend to pick out one or two songs as inspiration points for each major piece of writing I'm working on. This goes beyond just "setting the mood"; I'll pace in front of my desk, imagining the characters and mentally setting little movie trailers of the story to the music blasting away on my earphones. Some of the most important scenes in my books are developed this way.
I don't really have a process for picking a song. I always seem to find them by accident, just over the course of surfing Last.fm or playing with Spotify. But then again, writing a book takes a lot of time ... so odds are I'll find something that clicks eventually.
Anyway, in the interests of fangirling over bands most people have never heard of (and some people have but for the wrong reasons *sigh*) ... here's my list. All song links are to Soundcloud unless otherwise specified.
Songs for Completed Projects
Split Self
I found Smith & Pyle's Slippery Hips (Spotify) through the now defunct Popcharts (*sob* ALL MY FAVORITE INDIE MUSIC SITES ARE GONE~~) and as soon as I heard it I was amazed at how perfectly it fit Lily and Clare's relationship (Lily's a guy BTW ... I have to say that so often now I feel like that should be the official subtitle of Split Self >.<). It's a fantastically DIRTY song that they get away with because they're two cute girls.
Also on rotation were Theoretical Girl's Red Mist (the demo version is a thousand times better than the official release), and The Generationals' Nobody Could Change Your Mind was on endless repeat when I was writing the silent disco scene.
The Destructibles
For some reason nothing got me more in the mood for this Orwellian style dystopia better than Beirut's Elephant Gun which sounds a bit like it should be playing on a carousel. This introduced me to Beirut and their music has a richness and complexity that makes it easy to write to.
Guttersnipe
As much as I'd hate to ruin my indie street cred by admitting this ... I wrote most of Guttersnipe to Florence + The Machine's What the Water Gave Me (Spotify). It had just the right fit: moody, mercurial, but at the end released and reborn. I hate how Florence + The Machine is tied to Eat, Pray, Love and branded like some kind of Enya-for-the-Lady-Gaga-Generation when in reality her songs are dark, violent, and sarcastic. Sure Dog Days is uplifting ... but listen to the lyrics of The Girl with One Eye or Kiss with a Fist.
Also for some reason while I was writing Guttersnipe I went on a bit of a Vivaldi kick *lol* ... make of that what you will. And while editing it I developed a thing for Shona Foster's No. 34. The lyrics are a bit too romantic and nostalgic, but the melody itself fit what I wanted the reading experience to feel like.
How To Quit Playing Hockey
Oddly enough I don't think I really had anything specific for this one. I was listening to my playlist's for HBO 24/7's Winter Classic specials pretty much non-stop though and that may have been why. Nothing better for hockey slash than hockey soundtracks. Favorite tracks: The Black Key's Lonely Boy, Mutemath's Blood Pressure, Popstrangers' Happy Accidents, and Malajube's Montreal -40*C
Songs for Current Projects
The Condor
Why is BDSM always so angsty and depressing? D: Is there anything sillier than a guy in black leather futzing around with medieval dungeon equipment? No, I think not. For this semi-sweet, semi-sarcastic kinky sex romp I use a lot of glam-rock-inspired indie favorites like OK Go's WTF? and Jet's aptly titled Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is (Spotify)
The Freelancers (part one)
Oh my little erotic M/M spy+crime opus. Will I ever figure out how to publish you? O.o Will I ever finish revising you? Probably not ... for the time being I listen to Duels' Regeneration, The Kill's Satellite (Spotify), and Spoon's Written in Reverse.
The Freelancers (part two)
Just drafting at this point, but this book is much more Yuri focused. Beirut's The Gulag Orkestar is basically Yuri's song in my head.
Season in the Red
This reboot of my first webserial is going to hold me up creatively until I finally finish it. It haunts me, it has a cult following that asks me about it ALL THE TIME *lol* Anyway, I'm redeveloping it into a series of novellas and trying to fix the worst of the structural problems with it (ugh) If I'm able to do that this summer I will be EXTREMELY happy.
Anyway, for these "secret life of men" locker room tales The Fratellis's My Friend John (Spotify) (*lol* There's more to The Fratellis than Chelsea Dagger!) and Leningrad's Kopeyka(Spotify) (Russian ska music is the best~~) were always cued up.
Songs for Developing Projects
Protopolis
This has been a very strange book for me musically so far. I'm hoping to finish up the revisions on part one of The Freelancers and get back to working on this more regularly again. I started off with some very hard Chevelle with Mexican Sun (Spotify) and Humanoid (Spotify) but as the first part of the book is told from the perspective of a shallow 16 year old girl I've since slipped into things like Laura Veirs's Salvage a Smile (Spotify) and The Asteriod Galaxy Tour's Out of Frequency (Spotify) ... sometimes I split the difference and listen to Evans Blue's Caught a Lite Sneeze (Spotify) (hard rock cover of Tori Amos? YES PLEASE!)
Reversal
Most of the time what determines which projects get worked on when is the likelihood that I can figure out a way to publish them when I'm done. There's absolutely nothing worse than finishing a book only to have to put it on the shelf because it doesn't fit what publishers want and you don't have the resources (or energy) to self-pub it. You end up coming back to it months later and only seeing its problems then getting lured into rewriting most of it (*cough* The Freelancers >.<)
So Reversal is going to happen ... I'm just not sure when, because Reversal is so much a red haired stepchild of M/M Romance it makes Guttersnipe look like a perfect fit for the genre. It's moody, about the futility of regrets, and written in second person (AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA~~) This is one of those books that you publish when you're crazy famous and people will let you get away with anything.
My songs for it are Arcade Fire's Rebellion (Lies) (Spotify) and The Rural Alberta Advantage's Frank, AB which I picked up because it was used in the trailer for the AWESOME French documentary that inspired part of Reversal's plot (I Believe I Can Fly (Flight of the Frenchies), watch it NOW ... your mirror neurons will thank you)
A Remarkable Creature
It's strange to have songs for a story I have not written a word of yet but ... hahah, whatever. I'm pretty sure this idea will survive because I have always wanted to try writing STEAMPUNK! :D Set in Paris between the Expositions (World's Fair) of 1889 and 1900 it will have some BDSM overtones but probably not erotic. Primarily a vehicle for all this pent up angst I have regarding being a woman working in an industry with a sexist frat house mentality. My songs for it are Peggy Sue's D.U.M.B.O and The Pierce's Love You More
Songs for Projects in Limbo
Girls on Top
My contract with the publisher committed to this project was terminated a few months ago after they decided not to pay me or provide me with accurate sales reports. So I'm not sure what will happen with this. Probably just as well to scrap it altogether, since it was a Gossip Girl style take on the world of startups. Being that my day job has since shifted from working primarily with publishers to working primarily with startups ... moving forward with such a book might not be so *cough* politically expedient? ^_^;;;; But I always did like the playlist I had for it which included lots of BRMC, La Roux's Tigerlily, Emily Wells's Symphony 8 & the Carnary's Last Take (Spotify), Little Barrie's Pin That Badge, and Soul Coughing's Super Bon Bon (Spotify)
....so what about you guys? If you write, what do you listen to while you're writing?
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Emma Sea
(last edited Jul 10, 2012 02:42PM)
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Jul 10, 2012 02:41PM
Just curious: why do you want to write Reversal in the second person? It's so interesting that you're doing this, because it really foregrouds the identification of the reader with the MC. I'd love to read about pushing my mighty veined cock into someone's quivering portal.
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Emma C wrote: "Just curious: why do you want to write Reversal in the second person? It's so interesting that you're doing this, because it really foregrouds the identification of the reader with the MC. I'd love..."Well okay it's not technically true second person, but it comes off a bit like it. Really, the entire book is a long letter from the MC to the guy who broke his heart and left him alone, in debt, in a foreign country. And the MC is basically retelling how they met, how he fell in love with this person, etc, etc, etc, and filling in the blanks of their story that his love interest doesn't know about (along with just general musings about his attractiveness ^_^) ... a lot of 'you this...' 'you that...' 'I did this and you responded with...'
I have no idea how I'm going to handle sex scenes in this style to be honest @_@ I feel like the 'you's would be so jarring they would shatter the fantasy, but I'll probably give it a shot and if I don't like it I'll just make it a fade to black thing ... because might as well make it completely unmarketable *lol* XD
Ah, so more an epistolary novel! Cool!
WeaselBox wrote: "I find present tense usually makes me feel like I'm watching a movie by proxy, as if someone else were in the theater describing what's happening to me over the phone. "lol, yes.
Emma C wrote: "Ah, so more an epistolary novel! Cool!"I suppose, but I always think of epistolary as multiple documents rather than one really long one ^_^
WeaselBox wrote: "Epistolary is okay, second person is vomit. Hell, I'd avoid first person if it weren't for the fact I like detective novels and a few of my favorite writers do it very well. I don't think I could..."
....I just finished watching an episode of the very old Sherlock Holmes TV show and somehow imagined this entire reply in Jeremy Brett's voice *lol*
But otherwise, I wouldn't write off entire styles as universally "vomit". It's just there's rarely any need to write a novel in second person. It doesn't usually bring anything to the table that a more traditional narrative style couldn't. But try playing a CYOA without second person ... it's no where near as fun :D
In this case, the MC of Reversal discovers he has the ability to rewind time. The second-person-ish elements are really about filling in the blanks. He perceives it all as one long chain, but in actuality his lover is unaware of some of the events because they happened on a different timeline.
Isa wrote: "In this case, the MC of Reversal discovers he has the ability to rewind time. The second-person-ish elements are really about filling in the blanks. He perceives it all as one long chain, but in actuality his lover is unaware of some of the events because they happened on a different timeline. "Ooooh! Like Dr Who and River Song! Love love!
EDIT: Actually, no, because they're both missing bits as they move through time askew to both each other and the rest of the time line
I don't listen to anything when I review (the only kind of writing I do). And anyway, most of my music are just game themes... =P
Experiment BL626 wrote: "I don't listen to anything when I review (the only kind of writing I do). And anyway, most of my music are just game themes... =P"I can imagine the Legends of Zelda theme being very interesting to write to XD It would always get stuck in my head. Really elegant for eight-bits
I write a tiny bit of non-fiction: journal articles and stuff. For that I like mostly ambient electronica: Solar Fields, Hol Bauman, Hybrid (complete faves), she, and movie soundstracks by Tomandandy.
Isa wrote: "Experiment BL626 wrote: "I don't listen to anything when I review (the only kind of writing I do). And anyway, most of my music are just game themes... =P"I can imagine the Legends of Zelda theme..."
It's all Final Fantasy for me.
Confession: I dance to the battle themes... if you define dancing to be moving awkwardly and embarrassing oneself.
Emma C wrote: "I write a tiny bit of non-fiction: journal articles and stuff. For that I like mostly ambient electronica: Solar Fields, Hol Bauman, Hybrid (complete faves), she, and movie soundstracks by Tomanda..."Movie soundstracks? Hmm. Interesting. I got music trailer themes. =D
Isa, how much am I digging the demo of Red Mist you linked to! I have the album version from Divided and never really cared for it before.
I know! I don't know why the chose to slow it down for the professional version :/ It lost so much of its bite.
Updated the list with The Condor:The Condor
Why is BDSM always so angsty and depressing? D: Is there anything sillier than a guy in black leather futzing around with medieval dungeon equipment? No, I think not. For this semi-sweet, semi-sarcastic kinky sex romp I use a lot of glam-rock-inspired indie favorites like OK Go's WTF? and Jet's aptly titled Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is (Spotify)
