Looping Music Takes Me to a “Place” Where I Can Write

Putting songs on repeat helps me get into a writing flow, return to my projects after time away, and access memories and moods more easily.

If you saw a photo of my desk, you might be disgusted. There are bottles of melatonin and allergy pills, drawers feathered with receipts for reimbursement, some checks I’ve (hopefully) cashed, and whatever three jars of liquids I’m drinking from at the moment. And anyway, I prefer to write on the couch, which is velvet and blue and generic in the way that couches tend to be.

I wrote the majority of my first book, How Far the Light Reaches, in a slew of places: hunched over this messy desk, sunken into this generic couch, curled in my bed, squeezed on a seat on the subway, collapsed on the floor of a conference room, in a call room of a coworking space. I had a full-time job for most of this time and couldn’t be precious with my space. When I asked one of my editors how he managed to write a book on top of a full-time job in journalism, he said he woke up every day before sunrise and then went to work, and right then I knew that this was very admirable and also could never be me.

Wherever I found myself writing, I struggled to make any headway into my work. I was distracted by my new surroundings, always looking up at strangers wandering by or my own hapless clutter. I would spend most of my allotted time trying to remember how to pick up where I’d left off, and by the time I’d gotten into any kind of groove, it was time for bed, for dinner, for drinks, and I would tell myself that sometimes writing looks like staring at a blank page. This is true, of course, but all writing cannot be staring at a blank page, or else I would never have written a book.

I wondered what would happen if I created a ritual for my other senses. I always write in a bubble of intentional sound, the rest of the world blurred with my noise-canceling headphones, and I’d developed a practice of looping single songs over and over as I typed. While writing my book, I approached my music choices with more intention, creating a playlist of songs I could loop ad infinitum. Many of these songs had no words, or words in another language. Many blurred at the edges, helping me forget when a song ended or began again. As Ingrid Rojas Contreras wrote for The New York Times Magazine, looping music encourages a trance, allowing the mind to embrace concentration.

But I did not compile my playlist for concentration alone. Each song conjured a particular and coveted mood, a kind of emotional poncho I could throw on while on the subway or in my office to remind me of my task at hand. Just as a certain smell can conjure a vivid memory, these songs anchored me in the work and even offered a subtle kind of recall. I would press play and greet a wave of thoughts from the last time I’d listened.

Looping music encourages a trance, allowing the mind to embrace concentration.

Certain songs provided passage into different essays in my book, lubricating my transition from one piece to another even in the same writing session. There was one essay I always dreaded writing; I felt nervous and self-conscious that I had nothing new to say on the subject. Looping Powder’s “Gift”—a brisk, propulsive electronic song that reminded me of many tiny bubbles bursting in rapid succession with no clear climax—made it much easier to write in an unapologetic stream. For another essay, which involved a great deal of imagining, I looped Burial’s “Space Cadet,” a euphoric, ascending sort of song that felt like a rainstorm had formed a gospel choir. I found myself racing to complete an idea or a scene before the song ended, buoyed by its sheer energy.

I used to consider these songs sacred, afraid that sharing them might unbottle some of whatever magic they had on me. But I finally finished my book! So I want to share some of my loops with you, in case they can help you summon specific corners of your brain or emotional atmospheres, and share how I used them.

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“Gift,” by Powder
This song makes me feel as if I am inside a champagne glass, surrounded by wavering curtains of ascending bubbles. I play “Gift” when I am having trouble getting words on the page, and it reminds me that an abundance of tiny, half-formed, or misshapen thoughts is better than nothing at all and, from a distance, can take the form of a bigger idea.

“saudade, saudade,” by MARO
This was actually Portugal’s entry to Eurovision 2022, and I loop this to write about my grandparents. It is a melancholy song, one that floats on its sense of yearning and sadness. And the first line—“I’ve tried to write”—reminds me there will always be a gap between our experiences in the world, but all I can do is try and try to write.

“Space Cadet,” by Burial
Do you want to write an essay that concludes like Mentos in a Coke, an essay that runs all the way up that hill and succeeds in making a deal with whoever’s up there? Looping this song makes me feel like an Olympian, surging higher up a mountain or into the clouds, and asks me to push as hard as I can into the exhilaration of the text. How much ecstasy can I wring from these words? How can I make sentences that mimic a harp?

“Skin,” by Grimes
“Skin” was the first song I ever seriously looped, and I find myself returning to it whenever I am writing to understand something about myself I have never before articulated. “Skin” feels like sighing over and over and over again, seeing what truths might tumble out.

“Barké,” by Falle Nioke and Ghost Culture
I listen to “Barké” whenever I am trying to articulate a spicy opinion or rant. It’s a prickly and playful song, good for shedding self-consciousness and leaning into the edges of a thing.

“Roslyn,” by Bon Iver and St. Vincent
Yes, this is from the The Twilight Saga: New Moon soundtrack. I use it when I’m writing about a forest or some other kind of wild space. I can’t help that this is how my brain works. I guess the wolf’s out of the bag!

“Limerence,” by Yves Tumor
No matter where I am or what I’m doing, “Limerence” transports me to the calm space behind a waterfall or inside the hollow of a tree. The song includes brief, spoken intimacies between a pair of lovers that feel universal enough to understand as another kind of instrumental accompaniment to the actually instrumental backdrop of the song, which is a rippling loop. I play “Limerence” when I am writing about love—past and present—to help me remember our tenderest moments as if they happened yesterday.

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How Far the Light Reaches, a book by Sabrina Imbler, inspired by their Catapult magazine column My Life in Sea Creatures, is on sale now.