Posts Tagged Linkin Park
The Undercover Soundtrack – Wendy Storer
Posted by Roz Morris @Roz_Morris in Undercover Soundtrack on March 12, 2014
‘Drumming is my heartbeat’
Once a week I host a writer who uses music as part of their creative environment – perhaps to connect with a character, populate a mysterious place, or hold a moment still to explore its depths. This week my guest is Mslexia award-winning YA novelist Wendy Storer @WendyStorer
Soundtrack by Metallica, Linkin Park, Papa Roach, Avenged Sevenfold, Rush, Green Day, Razorlight, The Killers, Blink 182, Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, Nirvana, The Who, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Sugarcult, Rise Against, Arvo Part, Willie Nelson, Seafood
Bring Me Sunshine is the story of a young musician, Daisy, a wannabe rock drummer thwarted in her ambition by her dad’s resistance to noise. She’s 15 when she realises his bizarre behaviour and increasing number of memory lapses might be due to more than a quirky personality, and as the story unfolds the impact of Dad’s dementia on Daisy’s life is uncovered.
Hope, direction and power
I couldn’t have written this story without immersing myself in the sort of music Daisy loved and aspired to play.
Drumming is my heartbeat…
she says; it gives her hope, direction and power. When she can no longer play, she is lost.
I listened to hours, days, weeks’ worth of music in order to put myself in Daisy’s shoes. I found myself thinking ‘Daisy would LOVE this’, or ‘this isn’t Daisy at all’. I discovered bands like Linkin Park, Papa Roach, Avenged Sevenfold and Rush, and made myself a playlist of their music. Other bands on the list were Green Day, Razorlight, The Killers, Blink 182, as well as the rock gods of my own teen years: Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, Nirvana, The Who, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Metallica…
Daisy’s playlist took me back in time to the memory of what it was like to be a teenager, (messing up at school, falling in love for the first time, wanting something so terribly badly that just didn’t seem possible) and helped me connect to her life now.
Bring Me Sunshine is a sad story, but it’s also a story of hope, of living in the moment and how that sets Daisy free, so the music I chose to listen to was often tinged with sadness, always powerful and at times liberating.
This song for example – Nothing Else Matters by Metallica – never failed to put me in touch with Daisy. I imagined her wrestling with her fears, afraid of the consequences of both truth and lies, then hearing Metallica’s power ballad about the need to trust in ourselves and be true to who we really are, before coming down on the side of truth.
Songs for resonance
Each chapter is a song title, and every single song was chosen deliberately for its emotional resonance. Daisy listens to: Numb by Linkin Park when she first starts to realise something is wrong with Dad; I Miss You by Blink 182 when she’s remembering her mum; Memory by Sugarcult when Dad remembers his brother Ziggy; No Prayer for the Dying by Iron Maiden when Daisy and little brother Sam go out into the stormy night to search for their lost dad. These are all powerful pieces of music with a touch of melancholy, and mean something in the context of Daisy’s experiences in the book. This is Letting Go by Rise Against has a more hopeful vibe and it’s what Daisy (and I) listen to when Daisy finally faces up to her problems and tells someone what’s going on at home.
And so my playlist, my undercover soundtrack, is also Daisy’s. Apart from this one piece of music – Variationen zur Gesundung von Arinuschka by Arvo Pärt. I would often listen to this while out on Kendal Castle with my dogs. It’s a piano solo, which begins with a simple melody and builds into something more complete and rounded. There was something about the quiet minimalism of this tune which always helped me get back to the story. There’s still that hint of melancholy in the beginning, but as the tune builds, the deliberateness and focus somehow takes over. On reflection there is something about this tune which mirrors Daisy’s journey. I did not know until I wrote this post that the title means Variations for the Healing of Arinushka. I couldn’t find anything about the history if this piece but I completely ‘get’ how the healing quality of this piece has always led me back to Daisy’s story.
The referenced title track of Bring Me Sunshine is an acoustic version of the song by Willie Nelson. Sunshine (both literally and metaphorically) is what Daisy needs in her life.
If I had to choose one song from Daisy’s playlist to represent the story, I would choose this one – This Is Not An Exit, by Seafood with Caroline Banks on drums. It comes near the end of the story, when Daisy has started to play the drums again and is able to listen to tracks with female drummers once more. This song captures the mood of the book for me. There’s something about the quality of the sound, the chord dynamics and the lyrics also, which resonates with the Daisy in me, in a way that the other songs don’t quite. When I hear this, I can feel Daisy fighting back, finding herself and knowing that whatever has happened in the past, and whatever else happens in the future, she will find a way to be happy.
Wendy Storer is the author of YA stories Bring Me Sunshine and Where Bluebirds Fly. Bring Me Sunshine was a finalist in the Mslexia Children’s Novel Competition 2012. She is interested in stories which tug at the heart strings and the amazing resilience of people who battle through desperate situations to come out the other side, happier. Originally from Essex, Wendy now lives in Cumbria where she teaches creative writing to adults and children, and offers editorial help to writers through Magic Beans literary service. When not writing, Wendy likes to walk her dogs, spend time with her family, and find new and exciting food combinations involving peanut butter. Find her on her website, blog, and on Twitter as @WendyStorer
The Undercover Soundtrack – Kim Cleary
Posted by Roz Morris @Roz_Morris in Undercover Soundtrack on February 5, 2014
‘I write about love and hope’
Once a week I host a writer who uses music as part of their creative environment – perhaps to connect with a character, populate a mysterious place, or hold a moment still to explore its depths. This week my guest is urban fantasy author Kim Cleary @KimClearyWriter
Soundtrack by Choir of Hard Knocks, Joni Mitchell, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Leonard Cohen, Linkin Park
I love jazz, rock and soulful ballads. I enjoy a scratchy recording of Billie Holiday singing Fine and Mellow, as much as a glossy Youtube of Linkin Park performing From the Inside.
Music is an essential component of my creative environment, but I prefer to write in silence, or in such a busy place it’s easy to shut out the noise. I find myself listening to the story in the music rather than the story in my head and it’s too easy to get distracted.
Back to age 18
In preparation for this post for Roz Morris’s marvellous blog, I’ve thought about the music that sustained me while I wrote, and rewrote, my debut novel Path Unchosen. Remembering the music has helped me to relive the writing of the book. It’s written in the first person so I often found myself falling into the head of my 18-year-old heroine. When Judy first discovers she’s a necromancer she wants to deny who she is.
Playing the music again has brought back so many emotions. The sense of awe as Judy discovers what she can do. The fear of losing everything she’s gained. The pain of an intimate betrayal. Music reaches into my soul, finds the memories I’ve hidden away, and yanks the emotions to the surface.
I write about love and hope, so it’s no surprise most of the music that has affected my writing is about finding or losing love! In Path Unchosen, I write about the love between a daughter and a father; between friends as close as sisters; the naïve love between a student and her teacher; the first stirrings of desire; and a deep compassion for all creatures that feel pain, hope, and fear. Love and hope.
Sometimes I hear a snatch of lyrics and a scene immediately starts playing in my head. From Otherside, by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers I knew Judy would face the chilling realisation that she can’t go back, she can’t stop being a necromancer. I saw the scene play out between Judy and her spirit guide, in a forest dulled grey and soundless.
A whole relationship
With Joni Mitchell’s A Case of You, the mesmerising chorus triggered not just one scene, but the whole bitter and sweet relationship between Judy and her father. We played the song at my own father’s funeral not many years ago. Perhaps you won’t be surprised to hear that Judy finds the spirit of her father in a workshop and smithy not unlike my father’s.
Leonard Cohen sings Anthem like a man who has been on his knees in despair. Judy despairs too, but she never gives up hope. Not even in a specially created dark, cold, and silent prison, designed to cut her off from the dead who sustain her.
At other times, I use music to trigger emotion to get into Judy’s head. Linkin Park’s From the Inside is a powerful way to stir emotions of lost love and betrayal, especially when sung very loud in an empty house.
When I am very lucky, sometimes while listening to my favourite music, I become Judy. I dance my way across the soundtrack to her life, and ideas for the scene percolate like notes from a symphony. I fight for my life to pounding rock music like Chicgao’s 25 or 6 to 4, Deep Purple’s Black Night, The Red Hot Chili Peppers By the Way, and anything by Led Zeppelin!
I had to stop writing this blog post to sing along to the Choir of Hard Knocks’s version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. The arrangement showcases untrained voices, marred by poverty, substance abuse and illness. I was lucky enough to see them perform live and stood with everyone else in an ovation of several minutes. It was as if strength, integrity and hope, somehow transferred themselves from the singers to the audience. Just like it does in the best stories. The ones we love to read, and hope to write.
It’s a broken hallelujah. But it’s still a hallelujah.
Kim Cleary grew up in Birmingham, UK, studied medieval history and psychology at Adelaide University in South Australia and has worked all over Australia and in London. She now lives with her husband and a cocker spaniel in Melbourne, Australia. Find her on Facebook, Twitter (@KimClearyWriter), her blog and Amazon.
The Undercover Soundtrack – Zoe Sharp
Posted by Roz Morris @Roz_Morris in Uncategorized on June 20, 2012
‘I wanted music that was angry and soulful, both at the same time.’
Once a week I host a writer who uses music as part of their creative process – perhaps to tap into a character, populate a mysterious place, or explore the depths in a pivotal moment. This week’s post is by multi-award-winning crime author Zoe Sharp @AuthorZoeSharp
Soundtrack by Beth Rudetsky, Linkin Park, Moby, Breaking Benjamin, A Fine Frenzy, Nirvana, Pink
Music has always played a big part in my creative process, usually at a low volume in the background so it goes in on an almost subliminal level while I write. My CD collection contains wildly varying music from Gregorian chants and opera to Cajun and Zydeco. And just about everything in between.
Anger and wounds
For Fifth Victim: Charlie Fox book nine, it was particularly relevant. The whole theme of the book is not knowing what you’ve got until it’s too late. I wanted music that was angry and soulful, both at the same time.
By this stage in the series Charlie Fox is back at her close-protection job as a means to bury personal tragedy. She welcomes the dangers involved, despite the concerns of those closest to her. I listened to songs that stoked up those emotions while I worked, and the volume was cranked much higher than usual for most of the time. I was looking for an almost resentful tone, like that in Breaking Benjamin’s Breath.
Fifth Victim is a story told on a deadline — it has a ticking clock of kidnap and ransom where the outcome is not at all certain. The relentless beat of Nirvana’s Come As You Are really seemed to work with that. The MTV Unplugged live version is one that gets into your head and stays there all day. I revisited it while writing this piece, and it’s stuck there again now.
All through this story Charlie is working under pressure, constantly improvising and reacting. For those action scenes I needed a soundtrack with energy and raw power that also spoke of experience and loss. Linkin Park’s New Divide got a real hammering, as did Moby’s Extreme Ways.
But there are quieter, more reflective moments. Tasked to protect Dina Willner, the daughter of a wealthy Long Island doyenne, Charlie is asked if she’s prepared to sacrifice herself for her principal. At the time, Charlie says she hopes it won’t come to that. But later, at the hospital bedside of her lover — fellow bodyguard Sean Meyer — who has been in a coma for over three months after a near-fatal shooting, she thinks differently:
‘It didn’t give any comfort that Sean had gone down in the line of duty, as he would have seen it. Doing his job. Hesitation had never been a possibility with him and it seemed that to hesitate now would be to let down everything he’d stood for. So if it came to it, I thought fiercely, then yes, I would die to protect Dina Willner, as her mother had asked.
And maybe I’d do it just a fraction more willingly than I might have done, a hundred days ago.’
The longing and loss of such moments was beautifully summed up by A Fine Frenzy’s Last Of Days, and by Pink’s Glitter In The Air.
Song for Charlie
But the biggest musical moment of Fifth Victim came between the final edits and publication. I was contacted by the hugely talented US singer/songwriter, Beth Rudetsky. She wanted to write a song inspired by the book. I was stunned when she sent me The Victim Won’t Be Me, for which the students of Vision West Notts then produced a terrific video. The song is an interpretation of the book, and the video is an interpretation of the song.
The resulting combination is beautiful and haunting. And it is definitely part of my soundtrack for the next instalment in the Charlie Fox series.
Zoë Sharp wrote her first novel when she was fifteen, and created the no-nonsense Charlie Fox after receiving death-threat letters as a photojournalist. Her work has been nominated for the Edgar, Anthony, Barry, Benjamin Franklin, and Macavity Awards in the United States, as well as the CWA Short Story Dagger. The Charlie Fox series was optioned by Twentieth Century Fox TV. Zoë blogs regularly on her own website, and on the acclaimed Murderati group blog. You can also find her on Facebook and Twitter (@AuthorZoeSharp).
In audiobook
Click for Roz’s main website
Click for Roz’s main blog
My Memories of a Future Life 