Work Music

What do you listen to while you work and what do you suggest I listen to?

My work boombox has got so decrepit that you have to sellotape CDs into it and jam a pen in the part that registers the lid is down. But even that's only working 30% of the time nowadays.

Once I couldn't get a kouhei matsunaga CD to work and correctly surmised the CDr was slightly too heavy. I cut a piece off the edge with a pair of scissors and it played.

It was fucking beautiful.

I've got a week in the office on my own as my only colleague is on leave. Today I bought in mixtapes I made in my early twentys during my mushroom/psychedelic years. Lots of braindance and ambient techno/IDM mixed up with noise/merzbow/acousmatic/improv/concrete dribblings. Was pretty satisfying.

Now I've dug out another boombox at home. one of these:

I have a large CD wallet of CDrs at work but most of them are scratched and scuffed 'n' unplayable. So I'm starting afresh.

Here's what I've burnt so far:

Oneohtrix Point Never: r Plus Seven

Phoenecia: Brownout

Machinedrum: Urban Biology

Dalglish: Benacah Drann Deachd

Chuck Person: Eccojams Vol.1

James Ferraro: Far Side Virtual

V/A: Shangaan

Keiji Haino: yaranai ga dekinai ni natte yuku

Keiji Haino: I said, this is the son of nihilism

Hecker: Sun Pandamonium

Next I'm gonna do Anthony Shake Shakir: Frictionalism and Zoviet France: Popular Soviet Songs and Youth Music.

Any suggestions? I'm thinking I might like a disc of grindcore, but that would have to be at least five decent grindcore LPs to fill a disc.

I'm usually quite productive when listening to Jeff Mills. The Occurance, The Messenger, Sleeper Wakes, Alpha Centauri...

being productive wise i'd say:

http://www.discogs.com/Sight-Below-It-All-Falls-Apart/release/2239556

http://www.discogs.com/Ben-Frost-Dan%C3%ADel-Bjarnason-Sólaris/release/3209044

I use an ipod nano at work, and tend to prefer albums with lyrics.

jazz (with lot of piano) or classical. i try and avoid anything with lyrics unless we're out of the office because people are always talking (to each other or on the phone) and nothing to experimental or crazy as it tends to be distracting or the subject of careful analysis and/or discussion.

A mixture of podcast and music, i like to listen to 4 hours of podcast (audiobooks,lectures,etc) and 3.5 hours of music.

I recommend using this time at work to discover new music, its exciting and the songs you already like wont go stale.

I usually listen to mixes.

So many mixes around for free, pretty easy way to find out new bangers.

  On 8/26/2013 at 11:58 PM, Chris Toffer said:

I'm usually quite productive when listening to Jeff Mills. The Occurance, The Messenger, Sleeper Wakes, Alpha Centauri...

I have one Jeff Mills album on a hard drive somewhere, I remember it being pretty intense. Mayhap have to dig that out.

Still someone I haven't got around to checking out properly yet. Will investigate those you've suggested for shure.

  On 8/27/2013 at 12:10 AM, Teribal Felafal said:

being productive wise i'd say:

 

http://www.discogs.com/Sight-Below-It-All-Falls-Apart/release/2239556

 

http://www.discogs.com/Ben-Frost-Dan%C3%ADel-Bjarnason-Sólaris/release/3209044

Haven't heard of either of these, will check'em out!

  On 8/27/2013 at 1:55 AM, cloud capture said:

I use an ipod nano at work, and tend to prefer albums with lyrics.

I miss being able to bring my ipod into work. The security department/governors realised that ipods also have USB storage and banned them. I think they're paranoid someone's gonna come in with the doomesday virus on their ipod and mangle our intranet. Or walk out with a shitload of confidential documents.

Lyrics/singing when I'm working not so much.

  On 8/27/2013 at 2:35 AM, Nebraska said:

jazz (with lot of piano) or classical. i try and avoid anything with lyrics unless we're out of the office because people are always talking (to each other or on the phone) and nothing to experimental or crazy as it tends to be distracting or the subject of careful analysis and/or discussion.

Totes, I bought a radio with me when I started in my current department and listened to nothing but Classic FM for the first 6 months. Then I progressed to playing The Necks. I remember having Sex playing on repeat for the whole day once without my colleagues noticing.

  On 8/27/2013 at 2:41 AM, Deer said:

A mixture of podcast and music, i like to listen to 4 hours of podcast (audiobooks,lectures,etc) and 3.5 hours of music.

 

I recommend using this time at work to discover new music, its exciting and the songs you already like wont go stale.

I don't think I could listen to audiobooks or lectures while working. Would love to but I have to sit and read intel reports and then disseminate them to different departments mostly. So it would be too damn distracting.

If I'm alone in the office like I am atm I love putting new and out there stuff on, I find having it as background music can help more experimental stuff to 'click' more, as I don't listen to it with terminal intensity.

  On 8/27/2013 at 3:04 AM, chassis said:

I usually listen to mixes.

 

So many mixes around for free, pretty easy way to find out new bangers.

Agreed, I have quite a few WATMM mixes burned to cd at work actually.

So, for tomorrow I have burned:

Autechre - Oversteps

The Hafler Trio/Colin Potter/Andrew Liles - 3 Eggs

The Hafler Trio - Intoutof

The Necks - Drive By

Morton Feldman - ed. RZ 1010

Also gonna do a bit of Scientist (pacman and the vampire one), Radiohead's king of limbs, bunch of Mark Fell solo LPs and sensate focus stuff, DJ Rashad - just a taste, Harold Budd and Mantronix - Music Madness

I Iike normally listen to box sets or long playlists of a single artist while working. My top pick the last few years are:

Gas - Nah und Fern

Pole- 1 2 3

Early Vladislav Delay

Anything by The Caretaker

I've got the Gas and Pole ones, good idea!

S'what I miss about having an ipod at work though, as I could've had them as one long playlist.

Right now: headphones on, coding & going through the Hive Mind discography on bandcamp: http://hive-mind.bandcamp.com/

I always listen to James o'Brien on LBC (Londons Biggest Coversation) between 10am - 1pm.

Before, during (if the hourly topic isn't floating my boat) and after I listen to either my savage selection of tunes on my ipod or BBC6 Music.

Simples.

At work it varies, for focus on tedious shit I go to beat-heavy stuff. Techno goes well with digitizing and editing documents.

i always listen to kanye's late registration. time just goes by fast when i listen to it

An hour flew by listening to Mark Fell's Multistability yesterday.

Oval might be a good choice, also Steve Reich, Carl Craig's More Songs about Food and Revolutionary Art and Sessions and some Boris.

But I've found that listening to music all day long is actually quite tiring and makes it hard to concentrate... maybe not when you're working, I don't know.