[whak]

Mostly music with no lyrics. That’s key.

I’m currently enjoying brain.fm set to 30 minutes and synced with a 30 minute pomodoro timer. I enjoyed the trial enough to purchase a lifetime membership (using a discount code) as I feel much more productive, especially when combined with some Bose noise-cancelling headphones. I’ve spent more money on less productive things so I figured “why the hell not?”. It may just pay for itself.

If not brain.fm, then I’d prefer to listen to movie soundtracks, such as Another Earth, I Origins, Manglehorn, or The Wilderness.

Some artists I’ve enjoyed while coding:

Piano: Ludovico Einaudi, Dirk Maassen, Johann Johannssen, Olafur Arnolds, Joep Beving

Electronic: Tricky, Moderat (particularly the instrumental album).

Heavy Rock: Earthless, Russian Circles

Post Rock: Sigur Ros, Explosions in the Sky, This Will Destroy You

[ConcernedCoder]

I agree about 'no lyrics', at least in my experience, being the key to coding productively while listening to music.

What I'm wondering is, what is it about music WITH lyrics, which interferes with coding? ... is it the language processing side of the brain being overloaded or just distracted from the task at hand ( which would be translation...right? ) i.e. coding == actively translating tasks and concepts into a machine's language.

[whak]

I think lyrics tend to bring thoughts to the forefront which can interfere with the task at hand. They can conjer images and storylines that force your brain to fill in the gaps, just like watching a movie. Not to mention the thought processes involved with listening to a well-written love song. You better hope your love life is solid or you’ll never get any work done.

[vk23]

For me it works well to listen to music with lyrics that I know so well that I dont even really listen to the lyrics anymore.

In general I feel like music works better if I know it well.

I like to listen to more distracting music though when doing a "boring" task that does not require that much brain processing itself.

[whak]

Good point! A boring task would definitely free up some of that brain processing.

My coworker watches tv shows on his second monitor and listens to murder-mystery podcasts all day since his job mostly entails cranking out web banners and print ads of various sizes. He could pretty much do it with his eyes closed, as he’s been doing it for so long. Not to mention he’s just damn good at his job.

I guess it all depends on how much of your personal processor you can spare for your current task.

[TheAlchemist]

+1. Brain.fm works really great for me (and took the lifetime membership too) - it may be a bit hard in the beginning since there are no distractions as in standard music, but it works.

(and +1 for Ludovico Einaudi - love it !)

[whak]

A fellow HN user who also loves Ludovico! He's amazing. I had the opportunity to meet him a few years back and he's one of the nicest people I'd ever met. When I told him that I play drums to his music he said he'd love to hear it. A very humble and gracious individual, that Ludovico.

[luminobyte]

Agreed, brain.fm is fantastic. It's so much more pleasing to listen to than white/grey noise, yet it is not distracting.

Where did you find a code for lifetime membership?

[whak]

The promo code that I used, "mindpump", no longer works. I'd keep an eye out for any new podcasts sponsored by Brain.fm. That's how I discovered the old promo code.