Everyone who knows me knows that I have the soul of a Broadway star but the vocal talents of a seagull. I absolutely love music! I just don’t possess the talent for it. That doesn’t mean I don’t engage with music in my own way.
Like many other writers out there, I am not the first to admit that music is one of my ultimate muses. It’s a creative lubricant that gets those brain juices flowing! Sometimes a lyric hits you and inspires an entire fictional world. It’s amazing!
Music has been the driving force for every novel I have crafted – even if that is technically only two drafted projects. There are several other novels in the works that I have used music as a vehicle to help set the tone as I craft the plots. There is just something about engaging with a song that makes you feel inspired and gets you excited to work on a project.
My Spotify Premium is my most-used subscription service. I use it all day, every day, to help self-regulate and concentrate. When it comes to my writing, one of my favorite parts of the process is creating mood playlists for each project. Every story I pen has a different mood, a different tone, a different vibe. If I’m writing an epic battle scene, then a heavy metal song with some punch helps set the tone for that action I’m building on the page. Conversely, a heavy metal song might not be the song choice for a very tender scene between love interests in a romcom. Every genre has its time and place when it comes to my work, and I am more than happy to find every inspirational song a home in one of my playlists.
Using music as part of my creative process has expanded my taste in music immensely. I am much more polyjamorous than I used to be! A whole new world has opened up for me, and I look forward to discovering that new song that’s going to be the main spark of inspiration!
There are a few songs that immediately come to mind that have directly influenced the story I am telling or the future stories I plan to write.
The Evening by Wicked Peace
As I began working on Happily Never Afterlife in 2024, I wasn’t sure what I wanted the tone to be. Sure, I knew it was going to be a love story set in the afterlife, but I was not sure which direction I wanted it to go. Would I lean more seriously, or would I infuse humor and turn this into a romcom? Ideas were coming to me, but I struggled with the tone. When I randomly stumbled upon The Evening by Wicked Peace through a Spotify recommendation, it instantly clicked. This song right here! This is the vibe! The band has less than 100 followers on Spotify, and I feel incredibly blessed that I discovered this song. I’ve listened to it upwards of a thousand times in the last two years, and it has become one of my favorite songs. Something about its sweet folk/indie sound spoke to me just as much as the lyrics. I could picture my main characters and the world that was building around them during my first listen of the song. It was love at first listen. I can’t recommend this song enough!
The Grey by Icon For Hire
If it comes down to one song that describes my female main character in the sequel to my Of Oaths And Ashes trilogy, currently in the works, it would be Icon For Hire’s The Grey. Upon hearing the very first lyric and the hook, I knew this would describe this character’s journey in Book 2. She goes through a metamorphosis at the end of the first book, and the sequel focuses, in part, on how she handles this change and the consequences. This song, in its entirety, hit the nail on the head of what I wanted for her character development. The angst and pain that comes across through this alternative rock track spoke to the conflict building in this sequel, and it has helped me craft the outline for this project that I can’t wait to begin. I am so excited for how this sequel is going to develop and what other songs I will be able to add to my inspiration playlist!
While I love these two songs, it’s not always about songs setting the tone and character development. Sometimes it’s about what music I listen to so that I keep myself from getting scared when I am writing a scarier story!
It’s always great to set the mood of the story, and I always do that for my novels. But my short stories? Since my short stories tend to be within the horror/speculative arena, sometimes I need the opposite kind of music to keep me from spooking myself!
That happened when I wrote “And So The Ravenous Cry” in 2024. As I was researching cryptids to get an idea of what I wanted to use in this story, I was absolutely terrified of the Ravenmocker. As I was writing this story, I felt my skin crawl, and I had trouble sleeping at night. I ended up having to write the entire story with all the lights on in the room so it was nice and bright. My music of choice while writing was very upbeat pop tunes. Spice Girls, Sub-Radio, and ABBA were the big three artists that got me through that writing process. I will forever be grateful to them!
Shoutout to this 1990something by Sub-Radio for keeping me safe from scary cryptids!
Something about that story just really freaked me out, and it helped to balance out the creepiness of the story with the upbeat, happy music. It kept me grounded and focused on telling the story. Plus, dancing in my chair was a great way to shake away the chills running down my spine.
This year, as I’ve worked over the last month on a short story, I’ve really had to embrace music as a form of self-care. Some stories, you feel compelled to tell. Something triggers you into putting pen to paper. With some relatively recent current events that have been very heavy on my heart and soul, I set out to write a short story to explore those feelings. The problem is that it’s such a heavy and painful topic to fictionalize that I found myself having to step away from it for days to cleanse my soul. I used music as my grounding source when I felt my mental state getting too heavy into the material. I plan to release the story by the end of March 2026, so you will soon see what I am talking about. Music kept me sane and kept me focused on something positive while exploring negative subjects. It’s not a story I could have written in silence. I needed music to drown out the world and let me craft a world that had the outcome I wanted to see.
There is something to be said for the power of music when crafting stories. It provides comfort in the dark and inspiration in the light. While I could write without it, I don’t think that my stories would be as rich without its influence. It’s another way I can immerse myself in a vibe, a feeling, an alternate reality. It transports me to another time and place. It provides an escape where I can freely run and play amongst my characters in their world. I will forever be grateful that music has this kind of impact on me. It’s magic.
