Using music to move the narrative along - linking or playlists?

[ChloeTzang]

Ah, I guess that kills that idea then. I wont be able to link to the playlist in the notes either I guess. Grumble.

I have done it like this inside a story - no external link - just what to search for

(Note to readers: If you want to listen to the actual song while you read this, search for "The Heart Sutra (心经) by Faye Wong (王菲) with English Subtitles (High Quality Audio)" on YouTube)

 

[Britva415]

Note to readers: If you want to

Yeah - this is the right treatment. It's unobtrusive, it's unpretentious, it signals that the story doesn't depend on the listening in any way.

I mean, that shouldn't even have to be signaled at all. But if alternatively the pretense were that "I want you to listen while you read," that would be heavy handed and would signal that the story is incomplete.

 

[Cagivagurl]

Ever the devils advocate...

Might I suggest, and remember, I'm no expert...
If the story is strong, and writing provocative... The reader might feel compelled to search out themselves, the songs and music...
By attaching, or linking a playlist, you are coercing the readers...
In my mind, make the story so compelling they feel driven to find it...
Don't spoon feed it to them...
As a reader first, and having read a lot of stories based on musical content... If the story reached me emotionally, then I invariably have a listen to the songs... First off...
I need to be sucked into the story to make me feel the need to go further... The passion has to come from the story....

Just my thoughts
Cagivagurl

 

[alohadave]

I have done it like this inside a story - no external link - just what to search for

(Note to readers: If you want to listen to the actual song while you read this, search for "The Heart Sutra (心经) by Faye Wong (王菲) with English Subtitles (High Quality Audio)" on YouTube)

I've seen this in webcomics. I've played some songs a few times, but I don't know if it really improved the experience for me, but I'm sure some appreciate it.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Yeah - this is the right treatment. It's unobtrusive, it's unpretentious, it signals that the story doesn't depend on the listening in any way.

I get a sense that many writers think everyone's taste in the music is the same as their own. That's a false premise.

I've seen some of the playlists folk talk about, and wouldn't have a clue who the artists are. Just as, if I published a playlist from my decades of listening to music, most younger readers wouldn't have a clue, either.

The writing should do the heavy lifting in a story, not the soundtrack.

 

[ChloeTzang]

I've seen this in webcomics. I've played some songs a few times, but I don't know if it really improved the experience for me, but I'm sure some appreciate it.

I've also seen it in some novels - where tha author gives a list ofmucisand sngs referred to in the book as an appendix at the back John Ringo does this quite often

In my example, the song was an integral part of the story and the version I used was written into the story as well - a bit of an outlier as its completely copyright free and one of those old Buddhist sutra's that goes back hundreds of years. The version I used was quite specific too. It fitted the context of the story and the character perfectly.

 

[redgarters]

The writing should do the heavy lifting in a story, not the soundtrack.

Well... of course. It's not like a writer can force the reader to listen to music. That's not what I mean.

Like I said the story stands fully on it's own as it is. But for those readers who like music, like to get that extra feeling, get that extra mood setting that the chosen music can give the words, it would be nice to have an easy way for them to enjoy that.

The role of music here is just like in a movie. You don't strictly need a music score in a movie, but it can be a powerful inducer for the mood of a scene or the emotions being portayed. The same thing can apply with the written word.

 

[TheWritingGroup]

While it doesn't apply to @redgarters, I'm not sure why a story told as a combination of music and text would be somehow automatically worse than pure prose. It's just something difficult to do using the extremely text-centric web site we are all publishing on.

I like music videos, which combine the moving image with music. They aren't the same (exactly) as either short film or music, but that doesn't make them invalid.

--Annie

 

[Off_base]

Well... of course. It's not like a writer can force the reader to listen to music. That's not what I mean.

Like I said the story stands fully on it's own as it is. But for those readers who like music, like to get that extra feeling, get that extra mood setting that the chosen music can give the words, it would be nice to have an easy way for them to enjoy that.

The role of music here is just like in a movie. You don't strictly need a music score in a movie, but it can be a powerful inducer for the mood of a scene or the emotions being portayed. The same thing can apply with the written word.

I can imagine having a yt playlist launched in mini player mode, floating on my desktop, where I still have access to the controls so I can easily pause and skip the ads, while I read. Maybe you could even drop little symbols in the story as cues when to pause or advance to the next song in the list, for those who choose to listen while reading.
I'm all in!

 

[redgarters]

While it doesn't apply to @redgarters, I'm not sure why a story told as a combination of music and text would be somehow automatically worse than pure prose. It's just something difficult to do using the extremely text-centric web site we are all publishing on.

I like music videos, which combine the moving image with music. They aren't the same (exactly) as either short film or music, but that doesn't make them invalid.

--Annie

I think it's a question of personal preference. Some people may feel links to anything outside the text or turning on music is distracting, pulling them out of the story. Others might love the additional mood setting, feeling it draws them into the scene.

I tend to seek out the music. I sought out flamenco after I read @THBGato 's Desire and Duende, for example, even if the story is so incredibly well written that I quite literally heard the music she wrote while I was reading it (if you haven't read that amazing piece of writing, put it on your list).

In my case I tend to use music a lot when I'm writing. Many of my stories have certain music as a running theme. In Wake Me Up Inside for example, the album Fallen by Evanescence plays a heavy role for the MC's feelings, in her teenage trauma and how she works through that (however badly. I listened to Fallen on repeat pretty much the whole time I was writing it, diving into the lyrics, soaking up the powerful music, the anger and the traumatic feel of some of the songs. The story wouldn't be what it is without the music. But I didn't make a playlist or try to encourage readers to listen while they read. There, I figured if some people wanted to do that the album was easy to find. And from the comments it's obvious that some did.

In the case of my WIP we follow a radio DJ who's also a guitarist. Country music is a defining factor in her life, her love, trauma and redemption. I'd like to give the reader a chance to get into her head a bit better by listening to the music she plays and writes, because I'm choosing the songs to tell the story just as much as the words I'm writing. Most readers probably won't bother, and that's fine, but I'll be a happy camper if a few do and enjoy it.

There are some great suggestions here that help me, thanks everyone.

 

[redgarters]

Maybe you could even drop little symbols in the story as cues when to pause or advance to the next song in the list, for those who choose to listen while reading.

That's a great point I've actually seen that done on AO3 and read the story like that. Had forgotten about that, thanks!

 

[ElectricBlue]

While it doesn't apply to @redgarters, I'm not sure why a story told as a combination of music and text would be somehow automatically worse than pure prose. It's just something difficult to do using the extremely text-centric web site we are all publishing on.

I like music videos, which combine the moving image with music. They aren't the same (exactly) as either short film or music, but that doesn't make them invalid.

--Annie

I'm not saying it's invalid, I'm saying it's more than likely to miss the mark in terms of doing what the author thinks it does. It's probably skipped over by most readers.

Every decade has its own soundtrack, is the point I was trying to make. If every story set in the 2020s opened with a Taylor Swift set list in the introduction, I'd click out, go find something else.

Just as, if I opened a story with the Woodstock play list, more than half the readership are going to ask, who the fuck were those guys?

As always with special effects or gimmicks (because that's what song lists are in written fiction), in moderation. I've dropped a line or two from song lyrics into stories, but I reckon it always goes through to the keeper, even if (which I mostly do) I also drop an explicit reference to whoever it was. If the reader doesn't know the song anyway, I can't see anyone looking up the song. Leave the set list to the end, if you must have it.

 

[ElectricBlue]

The role of music here is just like in a movie. You don't strictly need a music score in a movie, but it can be a powerful inducer for the mood of a scene or the emotions being portayed. The same thing can apply with the written word.

That's not a good analogy. A film soundtrack is integral to cinema, it's an essential piece of film making. The whole point of it being there is to influence the mood, the emotional reading of the scene.

Try to imagine a Christopher Nolan movie without the Hans Zimmer soundtrack? Star Wars without its theme? I don't think so.

Try to read your stories without your playlist? Could easily do that. I might not get (if it's a contemporary playlist, I definitely wouldn't get) the extra nuance you've put there, but if the words are good, that won't matter.

 

[Djmac1031]

You can directly quote song lyrics in your stories, I've done it several times if I felt the song added some meaning.

There are endless debates about copyright issues and whether quoting a song will get your story flagged.

All I can speak from is personal experience and say I've never had that problem and I always make sure to credit the songwriters at the end

 

[Voboy]

Mention the songs. The readers will go find them if they want to.

 

[Djmac1031]

You can directly quote song lyrics in your stories, I've done it several times if I felt the song added some meaning.

There are endless debates about copyright issues and whether quoting a song will get your story flagged.

All I can speak from is personal experience and say I've never had that problem and I always make sure to credit the songwriters at the end

Oh and I should stress; Ive never quoted an entire song Just the few lines I felt were relevant to my story.

I wouldn't quote an entire song, that might be problematic. Plus it'd just drag the story down IMO.

 

[iwatchus]

Oh and I should stress; Ive never quoted an entire song Just the few lines I felt were relevant to my story.

I wouldn't quote an entire song, that might be problematic. Plus it'd just drag the story down IMO.

I did quote an entire song in one story because it was relevant. No problem from it

 

[Off_base]

Just an FYI, quoting song lyrics in print form is not copyright infringement, they're considered different mediums. I don't know what lit's policy is, but there's no legal issue with it.
The millions of fan made lyric videos on YouTube are legal.

 

[ColtonWrites]

I've seen works on AO3 that reference a song or playlist for each chapter. No links, just an artist name and song name. I've never personally bothered to look them up but I know some people like it.

 

[Britva415]

I know some people like it

Readers?

Or the writers?

 

[ColtonWrites]

Readers?

Or the writers?

Seems to be mostly the writers, tbh.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Just an FYI, quoting song lyrics in print form is not copyright infringement, they're considered different mediums. I don't know what lit's policy is, but there's no legal issue with it.
The millions of fan made lyric videos on YouTube are legal.

Lit policy is to not allow whole lyrics, but will allow quoting 50%.

I'm not sure that your contention is correct - song writers own their copyright, and anyone who covers their songs will pay a royalty, and anyone who reproduce lyrics without licence is technically breaking the law. Whether or not the publisher or lyric owner does anything about it is a different matter.

 

[Off_base]

Lit policy is to not allow whole lyrics, but will allow quoting 50%.

I'm not sure that your contention is correct - song writers own their copyright, and anyone who covers their songs will pay a royalty, and anyone who reproduce lyrics without licence is technically breaking the law. Whether or not the publisher or lyric owner does anything about it is a different matter.

The only case for copyright infringement is if someone claimed the song or lyrics as their own, or tried to make financial gain off of it in any way.
"Quoting" is not infringement.

 

[JGittes]

I think this topic divides along a couple of different generational axes.

My first programming experience was with Fortran on Hollerith cards, and although I've created Novell networks in hexadecimal and more recently programmed SQL databases, I'm not on social media. I learned to consume media by focusing on the individual experience. I read books, frequently with a flashlight under the covers after I was supposed to be asleep, and never listened to music while reading. While music might be something of a background to events in life or on the radio during a drive, music I was interested in was something I went to the trouble of listening to carefully with my full attention. A movie was a complete experience that I went to the movie theatre to view. The soundtrack was an integral part of the presentation, meticulously crafted and presented to achieve a total effect, ideally presented in an appropriate setting.

Those familiar with Instagram, Spotify, and TikTok may possess the skills to produce and embed playlists, as well as the experience of integrating such lists into their entertainment consumption. So, I can easily see that those younger than me (which, at 72, is almost everyone) would be more comfortable using playlists and more comfortable with the potential aesthetic appeal.

The second generational divide has already been mentioned; most music is current and potentially widely known for a very short time. I recently revisited a groundbreaking, 50-year-old album by a brilliant, famous woman who is still touring the world performing. I could easily insert a cue (or written playlist) to 'hear' Patti Smith's Gloria, but I suspect that most wouldn't have any idea of what I might be trying to convey. However, if I just quote and attribute the first eight words of the song, "Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not mine," well, the following 20k words write themselves.

 

[redgarters]

Readers?

Or the writers?

Seems to be mostly the writers, tbh.

Creating playlists with music used in stories was widely done in certain fandoms a few years back. It's a lot less now for some reason, but if you look up stories from e.g. Supernatural fandom from maybe 15-20 years ago you'll find a lot of stories that use music to immerse the reader. It's wasn't only writers that liked that - again using Supernatural as an example, the use of music and playlists in the stories connected directly to the use of music in that show, the music was often an integral part of the storytelling in the show, so it came to be used in a similar way in the fanfic, as a tool to create reader immersion and enhance the narrative. And it was obvious that a lot of readers loved that.
This has dropped off a lot since then, I don't know why. Maybe it's a generational thing or just shifting preferences. There's a lot that has changed in fandom in the last 20 years obviously.

I still think the principle is sound. Listening to the music referenced or used in a story can be a way to enhance the readers experience and immersion in the story. But, as with everything, wether the readers like that or dislike it is a matter of personal preference.
I'm going try it, and I guess I'll find out in the comments if people decided to give it a listen