Creative Writing Playlists

I'm sure I am not the only person who listens to music when writing my stories or working on my Fictional Milieu. I have two basic playlists that I listen to when writing or mapping. 

The first is entirely Orchestral Scores/Symphony type stuff. I use it primarily when writing action or battles. As one can imagine, given my last post, John Williams figures big on this list. But so does John Powell. I love his work. He is the natural successor to Lord Williams in my humble opinion.

The Lone Wolves Playlist #1:

Our Last Hope- Two Steps From Hell*

El Dorado- Two Steps From Hell

All is Hell that Ends Well- Two Steps From Hell

Lacrimosa Dominae- Trailerhead*

The Slave Children's Crusade (from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom)- John Williams

Coming Back Around (from How to Train Your Dragon)- John Powell

Goa (from The Bourne Supremacy)- John Powell

Raider's March (from Raiders of the Lost Arc)- John Williams

The Asteroid Field (from The Empire Strikes Back)- John Williams

Willow (from Willow)- James Horner

Battle in the Mutara Nebula (from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan)- James Horner

Imagine the Fire (from The Dark Knight Rises)- Hans Zimmer

Playlist número dos is a completely different animal. It's kind of a little bit over everything. I mean, it's really all over the damn place. As much as I love the first playlist, well, sometimes you just need to take a break.

The Lone Wolves Playlist #2:

Making Love Out of Nothing At All- Air Supply

The Heat of the Moment- Asia

Dr. Feelgood- Motley Crüe

Just Like Paradise- David Lee Roth

Love Will Turn You Around- Kenny Rogers

Islands in the Stream- Kenny Rogers & Dolly Parton

Bawitaba- Kid Rock

Sing- My Chemical Romance

Careless Whisper- George Michael

Blaze of Glory- Bon Jovi

I Don't Care- Fallout Boy

The Heat is On- Glenn Frey

Right Round- Flo Rida

Country Girl (Shake it for me)- Luke Bryan

Glory of Love- Peter Cetera

Sweater Weather- The Neighborhood

I'd Really Love to See You Tonight- England Dan & John Ford Coley

Hysteria- Muse

Sleeping With a Friend- Neon Trees

Witch Hunt- MDMFK

Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)- Big & Rich

After the Rain- Nelson

Emotion- Samantha Sang

Lay All Your Love On Me- ABBA

Ready to Take a Chance Again- Barry Manilow

Living After Midnight- Judas Priest

Burning Love- Elvis Presley

The Humpty Dance- Digital Underground

Girlfriend- Matthew Sweet

I usually set Playlist #1 on Repeat for a few hours while only taking one turn around #2 every time I listen.

*Two Steps From Hell & Trailerhead are two groups that produce music for Hollywood to use in movie trailers and have began to get followings for their stuff amongst some pretty loyal fans. You may not recognize their names but if you watch movie trailers or commercials, it's almost certain you've heard them.

Pandora!!!!

So, at one time, roughly two years ago, I was listening to Pandora Radio quite a bit. I stopped after a while because, for some reason, Pandora can't get it through its stupid algorithm the fact that I can't stand The Lord of the Rings soundtrack. Can't stand it. I hate the damn movies and I hate the damn score.

I typically listened to my John Williams station and would up vote anything by him, Hans Zimmer (especially The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises),Basil Polidouris, James Horner (Khan!!!!) Of course this means I would get a lot of Star Wars, Indiana Jones and The Wrath of Khan (which is great writing music, by the way). And I am more than OK with all of that. They're like the symphonic score to my childhood. 

But I would down vote Howard Shore's music at every turn. 

It got to the point where I would put Pandora on so that I could listen to music while doing the dishes every night and I was continuously taking a break to dry my hands and then scramble for the little 'Thumbs Down' icon whenever it tried to float the score form that turd of a movie trilogy past me. So, I took a break from Pandora and eventually just made a couple of great playlists of my own on iTunes.

Fast forward to about three weeks ago, I finally joined the 21st century and got a Smart Phone that had Pandora already installed. I thought, "What the heck? I'll give it another try."

 And you know what?

 Effing Pandora still insists on trying to make me like this craptastic music by pushing it on my every other effing song!!!!

Ugh. Back to iTunes. Which is too bad, because Pandora has introduced me to a few gems, most notably Lindsey Stirling's Legend of Zelda Medley. It's awesome. But I spent too much on this phone to chuck it through a window when it really isn't the phones fault at all. 

Pandemonia: The Filthsea

Far below the city of Darkstar, below even the labrynthine sewers of the known world's largest city is the Filthsea.

The Filthsea fills the bottom of a cavern so wide you can't see the far side from the shore near the falls that pour into the water from the sewers above it. The Filthsea was once crystal clear, pure and filled with subterranean marine life; collossal jelly fish glowing blue and purple, blind albino cave whales, and other more alien creatures. 

And then the sewers above eroded a hole through the ceiling of the Filthsea's cavern. The waterfall of sewage that cascades into the Filthsea dwarfs even the Drammenstorm Falls of the Redwood Reach. All manner of garbage and waste falls into the Filthsea and it has long since been a nauseous green and brown water of mutated marine giants and other more terrifying entities.

The Sewer Infantry rarely goes there as the Salmoraxii have made the shores of the Filthsea into one of their bigger settlements and footholds on this side of the Gate from their home world. One day, the more forward thinking, competent commanders of the Sewer Infantry hope to mount an offensive and take the fight straight to the Salmoraxii. 

Okay. All right. Important safety tip. Thanks, Egon.

Harold Allen Ramis
November 21, 1944- February 24, 2014

I'm not usually affected by the deaths of celebrities. I just don't get it when people identify with someone so geographically distant, someone they have probably never met, someone most likely nothing like their on-screen persona.

That being said, I was not only shocked to hear that Harold Ramis passed but I was shocked at how sad it made me.

I'm not going to do the math, but just spitballing it, I'd guess that Harold Ramis accounted for about 80% of my adolescent laughter.

Rest in peace, Dr. Spengler.
Don't cross the streams.

I stand corrected...

So, for the past few months, I have been telling my friends that Marvel bringing The Guardians of the Galaxy to the big screen sounded like a lame idea.

But then I saw the trailer...

I hate to say it, but I am intrigued. Though, I still think its a bad idea to continue making separate Avengers movies (Thor 2, Iron Man 3, etc.) rather than focusing on more team movies.

GFWG Meeting

This past Thursday was yet another meeting of the Glens Falls Writer's Group. Last meeting, I turned in Chapter 2 of my Atoms & Arcana epic. The first chapter was well received, all things considered. The second not so much. Well, I should say that the group picked up on many of the issues that I had worried about myself. And I also received two great ideas that might help me solve it. (Thanks Sandy and Chris)

One problem though, is that many of the others in the group just don't read Sci-Fi/Fantasy. With the genre comes a couple of conceits; made-up names and places (a lot of names). My story has a definite military fantasy feel to it, like say The Black Company. Not that I would dare to compare myself to a Giant. But by nestling comfortably into that genre, or sub-genre, a list of names comes with it.

This was the biggest criticism I received and the bulk of the notes I took away from the meeting.

If there happen to be any pros out there that were to read this, I would appreciate some advice on how to handle this issue, aside from giving them unique personality traits in broad strokes, which I am reluctant to do. (I don't want The Squad Joker, The Squad Cynic, etc.) I want them to grow and have multi-faceted personalities. And unfortunately, my fellow writers only get to read a chapter every two weeks, which I can understand makes it difficult to keep them straight.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Sewer Infantry Slang: Brown Breaches

Brown Breaches (n),(adj.): A horrifying, often soul crushing spectacle or encounter or used to describe said encounter. Can happen anywhere but usually involves a Greater Rift Aberration, a denizen of The Weirdwood or close call with one the Bleak Powers, like Xerqix or his depraved followers. Related: Slantways

(1)"That time we cleared out that Xerqix temple, we were surrounded by the Clown God's favored assassins and lost a quarter of our men. Even the Sarge agreed it was a Brown Breaches encounter."

(2) "Shit, Sarge! The cryptopi are droppin' from the ceiling! Brown breaches, Sarge! It's brown breaches!