Cris de Borja

Day 07 → Do you lis­ten to music while you write? What kind? How do you relate music to your writing?

I need a quiet environment to write. Except when driving, I don’t use music as a background. I like the mood it sets to have music on, and when music is on I will be listening or singing along. While driving it helps me stay focused on the road, but while writing, music (with or without vocals) or a lot of sound is breaks my concentration. I need to be able to hear the words in my head as I write, like a narration over the scene, as well as the dialog.

Songs are a big source of inspiration, however. I’ll hear something and it will fit a mood so well that the song becomes a prompt for a scene or moment I want in the story. Sometimes it’s the backbone of a story: Dido’s "Hunter" became a story about vampires, and Metric’s "Stadium Love" is inseparable in my mind from Stadium/"The Reward of It All." Live’s "All Over You" and Jem’s "Falling for You" are (to me) the opening and closing credit themes for my anime inspired magic girl serial.

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