Just curious, what do you folks listen to when programming? I can't have anything with lyrics, I end up super distracted. I mostly listen to stuff like Mogwai, God Is An Astronaut, Baltic Fleet - instrumental rock-based stuff that doesn't interrupt my train of thought too much. Anyone else?
Lyrics eat your brain resources. I heard during a course on application ergonomy, that it can take you almost 60% of your brain activity. A perfect example is when you drive a car. You make more mistakes when you take a phone call. And the first think you do, when you are lost, is to switch off the radio... In my case, I just put a web radio loundge style or jazz. Something smooth. Sometimes I put some more energized music like Prodigy. And sometimes a little classical music.
Strangely, I even find classical music too absorbing! I find myself thinking about the composition and things like that.
This. Though I don't program - just design the game I can't have classical playing. I end up listening to game soundtracks (a number of songs from Braid are great) or swing/jazzy music lately.
try Beethoven The piano sonatas by W Kempff, it always keeps me on the edge without abdorbing me! cheers
Basically anything without too dominant lyrics. Something at at least a medium pace. I listen to all sorts of stuff when working. Depressive black metal (lyrics, but you can't understand them), classical, jazz, etc.
Interesting thread! It really depends on the situation. When I'm in a high performance or productive phase I don't listen to music to be able to concentrate on what I'm doing. When I'm tired I prefer faster tracks like rock or sometimes even dubstep to keep me awake. During debugging something calm to keep me from going insane
I work best through the night, but I often find that I'm wearing headphones but I had forgotten to put the music on as I was too in the zone already! I also find that each project tends to have it's own album which gets played regularly. Taste will range but it's normally mellow stuff =) Except for once which was my last project of 2011 where the music was more upbeat. Back to 'normal' now.
Yeah if you have some music thats "for" what you're working on that definitely is inspiring. The best thing for me is God is an Astronaut. Totally stays in the background but at the same time makes you feel like you're diffusing a bomb or racing towards freedom. Good stuff to keep you going! But yeah for debugging, formless ambient or stuff with obscured lyrics that don't distract are great.
ES Posthumus ftw... gets me really focused when I need to, makes every project I do felt like the most epic sh*t I've ever worked on. Sometimes, a good mix of Trance and In Flames gets me going too... (I'm not a programmer though, I do graphics)
Ooh..ES Posthumus is good! like scaling mountains-level epic! Might have to see what that leads me to on Pandora.
+1 for ES Posthumus... only problem with that is it hypes me up a little TOO much sometimes and I feel like I need to go and battle an army or tackle a mountain on my mountain biking or something... I quite enjoy the Tron Legacy: Reconfigured album for some good times. Some of the calmer DubStep out there is nice as well for staying energized and in the 'zone.'
Agreed, Tron Reconfigured rules! Similar stuff = we can make the world stop by glitch mob. Can't sit still when listening to that!
Never music or TV when I program. Maybe a boring TV show turned low if I have something really easy to do. Music distracts me, possibly because I'm a musician and end up analyzing or listening too much. Possibly also because I'm kind of a crappy programmer.
I'm very similar. But would find a TV show turned low even more annoying than at normal volume. I'd be straining to hear it. Peace and quiet for me when concentrating. Perhaps that is influenced by the chess tournaments I competed in as a teenager, always concentrating in silence.
I mostly listen to Speed Metal while programming - but in a thight loop (one LP side for some hours). So I know the music, but do not listen actively to it. It is mainly for oversampling background noise.
Usually I'll have film sound tracks playing or solo piano. When it comes to music with lyrics, I tend to choose albums I've heard for many years rather than anything new so that it doesn't distract me.
Interesting thread indeed Personally I need something that is above the ambient, something that will "kill all other sounds around me" while at the same time something that I know very, very well. For the first part - various bands, from Pink Floyd, through older Metallica to Opeth and others. For the latter part - since I know the lyrics very well I don't listen to them anymore, and certainly don't focus on understanding them anymore either However, music from Tron Legacy does the trick even better ! It's so energetic and it feels so right, like it's in perfect sync with my inner rhytm
