Music to Code By – What Do You Listen to While Programming?
Mon, Dec 10, 2007
Some swear by it, for others it’s a bane: Music while programming. Throughout grade school, we’ve been cautioned not to keep the TV and music on when doing homework, but is it really counter-productive? According to this study, not so, at least for people who are understimulated — which probably accounts for most geeks these days.
Let’s face it: Geeks are ridiculously overstimulated. How many of us don’t constantly have at least five Firefox instances open, each nesting a dozen or two tabs, F5ing Slashdot and Digg, keeping track of new emails and countless IRC channels, and crawling from one Wikipedia page to another endlessly?
I initially coded in silence, the only noise coming from my ten year old keyboard. I became increasingly bored coding assignments for class because I was far ahead of the curriculum, so I began keeping music on. Nothing extraordinary happened… until I attempted coding in silence again. Without noise, I was restless and far more easily distracted. I didn’t bother kicking the habit, realizing that I can get into the zone more efficiently with noise on than without.
Sometimes I get so absorbed writing code that everything besides my awareness of the screen, and the sensation of my fingers hitting the keys, disappears. Sometimes when I’m getting out of this trance-like state of mind, it feels as though my code, or specifically, the rate and rythm at which I hit the keyboard is in sync with the current backbeat. Then I hit compile and my program works flawlessly, and I think: WTF? Where’d that come from? I’ve written some of my most elegant code in this state.
The music I listen to while coding depends on a number of factors. I prefer little to no, or very simple lyrics, unless I am familiar enough with the songs that I do not get distracted trying to comprehend or interpret the meaning. I rarely, if ever, listen to something I haven’t heard before while coding. I make a specific time for new music so I can give it my full attention. This rule is broken if the songs are a “familiar style” to previous songs, or lack lyrics and serve naturally as background or ambient music. Lounge (“chill out”) or New-Age music (drumming) for example.
I prefer classical, slow or soft, music while designing or debugging, but something faster and with a predictable pattern while writing code. I might increase or decrease the volume, depending on ambient noise and my current mood. Number crunching or writing mundane code (I know, DRY), especially when fueled by caffeine, usually calls for louder, faster stuff than when I am relaxed, writing a simple script.
Headphones get distracting, becoming uncomfortable and sweaty after being worn hours on end. After half a decade, I gave in and got speakers. I’d never go back to headphones. I suggest putting down at least a few hundred for a good quality set of speakers that will last. I generally like to have lounge or elevator music running in the background even when I’m not on the computer. I wasn’t able to do this with headphones unless I turned up the volume to max, in which case the music sounded so bad there was no use keeping it on.
Below are lists of stuff I listen to while coding, stuff recommended to me by others, and anything else that might be relevant.
Obligatory Geek Tunes and Tools
Pandora has replaced my entire music collection. Set a station and thumb up/down songs you like, and eventually your station will only play new music you’d like. I use PandoraBoy for OS X as my client and some of my stations are “blue bossanova,” “1976 by RJD2″ and “Tanz Mit Uns.”
Overclocked Remix (OCR) – Remixes of old school video game music. Sonic, FF7, Zelda, etc. Highly recommended, and it’s a great community.
mc chris – Rapping about Rob-tripping and Boba Fett’s Corvette? ‘Nuff said. (Check out nerdcore in general)
Coffee.mp3 – Coffee Replacement brain wave simulation. Can be played in the background beneath your music.
Some Stuff I Listen to (while coding)
Blue Bossanova Station – All the music I’ve been listening to the past year I’ve found through this Pandora station. I tailored the station to play trip-hop and downtempo beats. Zero vocals. Recommended artists on that station include Thievery Corporation, RJD2, The Polish Ambassador, Ratatat, Copy, and Blue Man Group.
Welder – Vines & Stream – This downtempo album grows on you with every listen. I like to keep this on while while reading or programming.
Buddha Bar – 10 volumes, each consisting of music from selected international beats/songs. It’s a must have, not just while coding. This is played in lounges.
Lemon Jelly – Electronica. It’s unfortunate they broke up.
Enigma – Also (primarily) electronic. The music is unique and good for background and foreground. You’ve probably heard Sadeness (part I) on the radio. I highly recommend their album Love Sensuality Devotion: The Greatest Hits
Ulrich Schnauss – Recently got into this after a recommendation in another paper I found online about coding music.
Bob Marley – I’ve been listening to the discography when programming, writing and studying almost exclusively. Excellent background and foreground music.
Philip Glass – Hard to get used to; Might annoy people in the room (at least from my own experience). I find it helps me focus.
Hotel by Moby – Good stuff. I’ve never heard anything else by Moby. I came across this while searching for coding music awhile back.
What Others Have Recommended
Dominatrix
Ambient 1 / Music for Airports by Brian Eno
WolframTones
Sources/tools for music: Songza | BTJunkie | gnump3d
What do you listen to while coding?
- Music To Program By (Javalobby)
- Music to make code by (RedHat)
- coding music (Everything2)
- Favourite coding music?? (9rules)
Thanks to conceptual for the spinning vynil photo.
Why not subscribe to the feed?. If you’re on a mobile device I suggest Viigo
December 11th, 2007 at 10:56 am
I’m all for ambience in my work music but I have a large mix of mainstream as well.
Everything from Iron Maiden, Parliament, Indigo Girls, The Eels, and The Dead Milkmen to the things more akin to your post – Fripp and Eno, Harold Budd, Tangerine Dream, Orbital, Aphex Twin.
I used to work in an office that pumped in white noise.
That was nice.
December 11th, 2007 at 1:51 pm
Powerglove – Video Game Metal: http://www.vgmetal.com/
December 12th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Interesting your comment about Phillip Glass. I find that sometimes I concentrate the best when the music I am listening to is more chaotic/unstructured. I especially like Ornette Coleman’s Free Jazz album for this, along with more modern stuff like DJ Spooky, The Boredoms or SquarePusher. Of course, this stuff can annoy many a co-worker who is not into it, so headphones are usually a must.
December 13th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
@Stevan
+1 for squarepusher….his virtuosic and chaotic electronic masterpieces are what i listen to almost all the time while doing any coding/writing.
December 17th, 2007 at 10:51 am
If you find Phillip Glass helpful, you’ll find Steve Reich even more so. He’s a colleague of Glass’s who came up from the whole 70′s minimalism scene. Reich’s early work is pretty non-musical (just phased drumming or clapping), but by the time you get to different trains, electric counterpoint, or music for 18 musicians, you’ve got beautiful albums you can put on repeat that will gear up your brain for some hardcore coding.
See also: Terry Riley.
December 31st, 2007 at 3:25 pm
Interesting topic!
I asked my colleagues(developers) about music the listen when coding and found that most of them prefer 1) rock 2) electronic music. What’s interesting that no one told he listens hip-hop or rap :)
As for me i belong to 2nd group(electronic music: positive trance, funky house) as it keeps me in tempo and listen online radios like http://ah.fm and http://di.fm
Thanks for must_haves :)
January 3rd, 2008 at 7:04 pm
water Ambient Ambient trailblazer
February 6th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
The issue with me is that I love hip-hop music. Especially, discovering new music and hearing something I’ve never heard before. There is absolutely no way I can have the music on while doing any kind of serious work. The music just demands attention. Anyway, I ought to look into different types of music :) Thanks a bunch for your music suggestions, I may check ‘em out.
March 18th, 2008 at 2:11 am
My choice in coding music really depends on my circadian rhythm state, and the type of work I’m doing. I almost always listen to psychedelic trance in the morning and at night while coding. It locks me into a hypnosis in which i perform my best, losing all awareness of existence other than myself and my code. In the middle of the day I ususally listen to dance/hi-nrg, and sometimes house and drum & bass.
Also, while designing i like downtempo or chillout, and while coding and debugging I prefer something fast paced and captivating (to put the mind in that beautiful symmetric flow, or “the groove”)
April 18th, 2008 at 6:25 am
GreenDay
April 18th, 2008 at 7:31 am
http://www.quiet.ch/search
April 18th, 2008 at 7:33 am
Metallica, Megadeth, AC/DC, Korn, Linkin Park, Rob Zombie, RUSH, Led Zepplin, Van Halen (early), Hole, Boston, Kansas, Alice In Chains.
April 18th, 2008 at 7:34 am
…., Alan Parsons Project.
April 18th, 2008 at 8:19 am
Iced Earth, Iron Maiden, Rush, Mercyful Fates, Dream Theater, Alice In Chains, Machinae Supremacy, Diablo Swing Orchestra, Cirque du Soleil, Delerium, some Enigma, Sacred Spirit, E.R.A, Erik Mongrain, Don Ross, Michael Hedges,
April 18th, 2008 at 9:10 am
My Last.FM acct is only open when I’m working. ^
Evidentially I listen to a lot of Ben Folds while I’m working, who knew.
April 18th, 2008 at 10:05 am
I’d second that Enigma recommendation, and the Marley. I have a fairly short list of coding music, but the stuff that’s on it *really* does boost productivity. Mine’s fairly weird but includes Rammstein (i don’t speak german so the workd don’t interfere but the thrash sound helps me achieve a real state of zen-like calm!), Bach (for the inner mathematician), Leonard Cohen (to inner artist), Alabama 3, Hanz Zimmer and the (new) Battlestar Galactica soundtracks.
April 18th, 2008 at 10:16 am
I second the Steve Reich recommendation.
Personally, I need energy in my music. I often times listen to Bassdrive.com or Drum&Bass Arena’s podcasts (1 hour mixes each week).
April 18th, 2008 at 10:42 am
I actually tend to listen to mostly Progressive Metal to Goth Metal. Bands like Kamelot, Evereve, Nightwish, Therion, Katatonia, Draconian, and others. There is a mix of Instrumental Rock, like Joe Satriani and some Classic Rock like Steve Miller and Pink Floyd – along with David Gilmour’s solo work. Sometimes I will throw in the Clash or some Nick Cave, also. Pretty much, anything that I already know, as to not have it be distracting, as long as it isn’t country or rap.
April 18th, 2008 at 10:59 am
Radiohead, Bach, Jurassic 5, Beatles, Punch Brothers, Andrew Bird, Glen Phillips, Nickel Creek, Led Zeppelin, They Might Be Giants
April 18th, 2008 at 11:48 am
I usually listen to movie soundtracks while programming. There’s no lyrics, it’s kinda like classical but modernized so I don’t fall asleep, and every once and a while they get all epic and make you feel like a bad ass programmer. My favorite right now is the Batman soundtrack. I can leave it on repeat and never have to mess with it.
It’s kinda dumb, but works for me.
Last.fm is great for this kinda thing.
April 18th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
+1 Depeche Mode, Square pusher & bassdrive.com
But you’ve never _really_ programmed until you’ve programmed while listening to Xanopticon
http://www.last.fm/music/Xanopticon
You are Neo. You are *The One*.
April 18th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
I listen to bands that don’t even exist yet.
April 19th, 2008 at 6:31 am
Minimal: http://deepmix.eu/
April 19th, 2008 at 2:27 pm
I listen to sad music. Really really sad. It makes me feel calm and clear I guess. For example: http://www.walrusmagazine.com/articles/2008.05-online-exclusive-saddest-songs/
April 19th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
I dont find Nerdcore too good for programming to, since the words tend to spark interest. But since that’s a good thing, here’s a local Berkeley group of science students making some good nerd music ^_^
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=130840283
April 19th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
can someone make an imeem playlist please?
April 19th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
What I listen to depends on the mood and where I am. At home, coding on my personal projects, I usually listen to either Metal/Hard-Rock, OR Classical OR (a little) Hip-Hop. At work it’s usually Metal/Hard-Rock OR House/Trance/Techno/Europop type stuff. I will very rarely listen to the latter at home as well, but not usually.
Out of those, on the Metal/Hard-Rock side, I listen to everything from 70′s stuff like old Alice Cooper, Deep Purple, Sabbath, etc. through 80′s hair metal – Motley Crue, Dokken, Ratt, Poison, etc. – to 80′s era thrash/speed metal – Megadeth, Exodus, Testament, Nuclear Assault, Overkill – to various power-metal, death-metal, melodic black-metal… everything from Kamelot to Judas Priest, Iron Maiden to Dimmu Borgir, Children of Bodom to Emperor, Opeth to Iced Earth, Nightwish to Dragonforce, Mortician to Incantation, whatever. Oh, and of course, Savatage and Trans-Siberian Orchestra!
In terms of hip-hop, my tastes are pretty narrow. I dig Obie Trice, Eminem / D-12, Doctor Dre, 50 Cent, old N.W.A, Snoop Dogg, Ice Cube, and a few others.
For Classical, I listen to Verdi, Wagner, Beethoven, Vivaldi, Orff, Bach, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Handel, Strauss, Gorecki, and Saint-Saens among others.
When I want Trance/Techno stuff, I just tune into one of the shoutcast stations and listen to whatever’s on. I don’t even really know specific artists in that genre.
April 20th, 2008 at 6:56 am
SLAY Radio: http://www.slayradio.org
May 8th, 2008 at 10:19 pm
Great!
July 1st, 2008 at 12:02 am
Anything by Ulrich Schnauss! All albums are amazing and perfect to get the codemonkey-juices flowing.
Also: “Magic Dragon” by Caia
100th Window by Massive Attack
July 2nd, 2008 at 2:34 am
Excellente!
November 30th, 2008 at 11:08 pm
Lately I’ve been listening to ‘underworld’. They are the group that did ‘Born Slippy Nuxx’ from the movie trainspotting.
March 14th, 2009 at 7:42 pm
I love hip hop music too, but it is demanding trying to pay attention to grasp every single spin of each lyrics and punchline as they are often containing much whit. I perfer to listen to camp lo or something with a nice smooth melody though to take my mind away from the lyrics and connections of every punchline. I love ppl like fabolous or ti, but they demand too much focus that it distracts from the craftsmanship of the code and makes it hard to do anything.
I find that switching from rap to something like r&b, or jpop, or modern rock works best when doing any studying or coding.
Listen to your favorite japanese intros and outtro from your favorite anime or some LP/creed/godsmack/nickleback/u2.
Trust me, chester bennington’s smooth screams and soulful croons coupled with shinoda’s soothing flow makes LP one of the best music groups to listen to when doing any computer work, period.
April 28th, 2009 at 8:48 am
I flip month-to-month between electronica (Lemon Jelly is on right now), heavy/drone rock (Boris, Jesu), and indie acoustic (like The Mountain Goats). Usually stick with one genre until it annoys me (about a month) then flip to the next.
Sam’s last blog post..followup: learning the singleton pattern
August 23rd, 2009 at 3:29 pm
I listen to whatever I feel like when I’m writing code. It ranges from good old Madness to Cradle of Filth.
September 15th, 2009 at 12:29 am
Arc by Neil Young
July 19th, 2010 at 1:46 pm
Late to the party on this but like the reccomendations above! If you like Lemon Jelly/Enigma/Ulrich you owe it to yourself to check out the following:
Phutureprimitive (esp. tracks that feature alyssa palmer)
Sounds from The Ground
Balligomingo
Thievery Corporation
D-Fuse (more dancy, but great)
Goloka
Btw, I am “SanjayU” on GrooveShark.
September 9th, 2011 at 6:06 pm
I listen to Death Metal/Metalcore/Grindcore (basically da heavy stuff) while I code. It helps me concentrate.
(Bands Like:)
Underoath
Sabaothic Cherubim
For Today
Extol
The Crimson Armada
and tons more
September 26th, 2011 at 11:41 pm
Music to listen to while writing computer code:
Try this for pleasure without distraction.
Gargantua is a set of 24 canons and fugues based on random variations of the Musical Offering by J.S. Bach. The piece is scored for string orchestra, piano and strings, solo piano and solo organ. Each section lasts about an hour for a total performance time of 24 hours.
Cheers
Terry
November 7th, 2011 at 4:35 am
Try http://www.sofaspace.net a listener-supported, independent and free internet radio station.
Always playing chilled out lounge music and never fails to save me from twatting around with my music library – which I inevitably do before starting work!
January 5th, 2012 at 2:35 am
Listen to my remix of Korn – Narcissistic Cannibal here :: http://bit.ly/wFTOto
February 6th, 2012 at 8:57 am
Tangerine Dream.
February 12th, 2012 at 2:15 pm
Great list – I’ve created a Spotify Playlist using your recommendations as a starting point: http://open.spotify.com/user/johnlbevan/playlist/6vOBGbZTZyYzLIXGWWtVCP. It still needs a bit of a cleanup since I dumped whole albums in, but hopefully people will enjoy.
I also found that soundtracks are good – they’re designed to be background music, but to get your excitement up. Amongst others, I’ve include Tron Legacy (by Daft Punk – always good music for coding), Sherlock (the new BBC series that is) & Batman Begins.
July 6th, 2012 at 12:20 am
I listen to a hell of a lot of industrial and electronic and I used to be deep into the rave scene so I know a lot of (to quote others) “Music like dubstep that’s actually good). Most of what I listen to that’s electronic is Glitch-Hop, so here’s some glitch hop artists:
Noisia, 16Bit, Ben Samples (Or just SAMPLES), Turnsteak, The Glitch Mob, Ill-Esha, An-ten-nae, Knowa Knowone, Kid Logic, Ill.Gates, Ooah, PANTyRaid, Na$tyNa$ty, Glitchy and Scratchy, Meesha, Joker, edIT, Mautilus, Prefuse 73.