I used to listen to classical music when I’d sit down to write something but the longer I worked the more my head would fill with numbers, until the whole room began to resemble code. Classical is great for thinking but I personally think it’s terrible for writing. When I write the worst thing I can do is think, it just bogs me down under a logjam of ideas and pondering whether I could have made that last bit sound better.

I don’t need to think when I write, I need to flow and I’ve found that flow in the last couple of years: smooth jazz. When I listen to jazz my synapses just line up and the words pour out. The musician could be playing an established song and decide on a whim to change it up with a dash of improvised gooey goodness, which just helps out even more because I can just pop out “Yes, and-” after “Yes, and-” for my short story without having to stop and needlessly think about it for an hour as I otherwise would.

I can’t get the tracks to start from the beginning without completely breaking the link and YouTube won’t begin it fresh no matter where I navigate to it from so just grab that little red place-marker and shove it like your younger sibling.