Listening to Mambo No. 5

I saw recently a video about a writing technique used by Stephen King. Allegedly, Stephen King listened to Mambo No. 5 so many times while writing one of his novels that his wife threatened to divorce him. Now, maybe I’m just perpetuating an internet rumor, but I decided the concept of listening to one song over and over again was intriguing to me. The idea is that endlessly listening to the same song puts you in a kind of flow state for lack of a better term. So, I thought I’d give it a try.

Before I begin to explain how this went, let me set up some info. The first and second day I forgot to even keep track of how many words I wrote, but I listed my songs and described how the vibe went. I have WIP 1 (a novel I’m currently drafting) and WIP 2 (a novel I’m editing). I started WIP 1 at 38,000 words and WIP 2 with 3 chapters edited

Without further ado—

Day 1, WIP 1: Cornelia Street by Taylor Swift

Day 1, WIP 2: Chiquitita by ABBA

I wrote my hockey novel that is currently in progress to Cornelia Street by Taylor Swift. For some reason, the day I started this project, I was feeling super into this song. It’s a pretty simple song without too high of highs and low of lows. (This is also a sneaky opportunity for me to geek out a bit on music, btw.) It’s an easy listen. Once again, I did not keep track of how much I wrote, but I did feel more focused and less distracted by changing songs. Same with Chiquitita by ABBA for my editing in WIP2. It’s an inspiring but simple song, nonintrusive. This song also felt easy to edit to and not too repetitive.

Day 2, WIP 1: I Always Miss You by Indianna Dawn

Day 2, WIP 2: Snow (Hey Oh) by Red Hot Chili Peppers

Another day where I did not track the progress but did note the feelings. I Always Miss You is a gentle yet sad song. While I quite like it, I started to get tired of it after a few hours and thought I’d choose a new song. However, as soon as I started shuffling my music, I got distracted on my phone. I got off of it quickly and wrote without music for the rest of my writing time. Editing with Snow (Hey Oh) by RHCP was magical. This is such a chill song and was perfect for mindless editing. A good steady, medium-speed beat.

Day 3, WIP 1: Beautiful Boy by John Lennon, Golden Slumbers by The Beatles

On day three (which is now a good time to mention that some of these days are not consecutive?), I started out with Beautiful Boy by John Lennon, beginning with 41,000 words. I soon got sad because at the end of the song John Lennon bids goodnight to his son and says he will see him in the morning. This triggered me to research how old John Lennon’s son was when John Lennon died (only 5). The entirety of my 'John Lennon’s death' spiral made me change the song, landing on Golden Slumbers by The Beatles because it had been stuck in my head after hearing it on an AirBnB commercial. Unbeknownst to be, this song is only 1:30 long, so it played many, many times. It was good, though; it had a nice build and an abrupt end. The draft made it to about 42,000ish words before I moved on.

Day 4, WIP 1: Cornelia Street by Taylor Swift, to see if it would spark anything, started at ~43,000, 43,242, ended at 44,450

Day 4, I went back to Cornelia Street (which Taylor Swift will never do again) to see if it would spark anything like it did on the first day. The whole idea behind this exercise anyway, I imagine, is to listen to the same song for a whole project, but I wanted to experiment with different songs and vibes. For the sake of the purpose, though, I came back, and it was good. I began at about 43,000 (from a random in between session that I didn’t listen to music for) and got to about 44,500—one of my best days yet.

Day 5, WIP 1: By the Way by Red Hot Chili Peppers, Better Than This by Lizzy McAlpine

The final day of this experiment because I kept forgetting and committing is hard. I attempted to listen to By the Way by RHCP because I love them and it’s a great song. I was vibing, but then my heart started to feel like it was going to beat out of my chest after only about 4 listen-throughs. I promptly switched the song to Better Than This by Lizzy McAlpine and made it to 45,100ish words with Miss Lizzy’s help.

As you can see at this point, I stopped even working on WIP 2. It just wasn’t what I was wanting to do at the time, so I didn’t. And after this, honestly, I stopped the experiement all together. I am someone who so desparately needs to be a plotter but is a pantser. So, even though listening to the same song again and again each session often worked for me, I still can't make myself do it consistently. I missed YouTube videos and lofi beats and curated playlists for that specific work too much.

All in all, this method was fun to try and may even be a decent tactic for some. But I'm no Stephen King, so alas, this is not my method of choice.

Or hey, maybe I just need a little bit of Monica in my life.