This is Your Brain on Music

Dear Gudrun –

I have been trying lucid dreaming as suggested in your blog http://livyurdream.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html.

Like anyone, I would like to control the contents of my dreams.  I have read that meditation helps with becoming lucid, and I have been trying the Diamond Method of meditation, which can shortcut the overall learning curve of Lucid Dreaming.  It's amazing when you recognize that life is occurring all at once, not just according to the linearity of one's perceptions.   I have been practicing for a few days now and I LOVE it!!!

Though I have no problem letting thoughts, feelings, and images pass right through me without getting involved, my worst enemy is those annoying songs that get stuck in your head!!   External distractions can be overcome, but this is crazy!!!

I'm not referring to songs I necessarily heard just before meditating.   Some songs just get STUCK in there...  hours, days, months after you heard them.  No matter what you do, you just can't shake them!!!   The problem is compounded by the rhythms of life that are so salient while meditating...  your breathing, your heartbeat, blinking your eyes...   No amount of chanting obviates stuck songs...  It just increases their hold. 

What can I do????                                                     

                                                             Hopefully,

                                                             Dream Catcher

Dear Dream Catcher –

Our brains are hopelessly sensitive to music.  Music is defined by repetition, and "stuck songs" simply contain "hooks" that are difficult or impossible to shake.  Don't worry.  Nearly everyone experiences them:  ninety-eight percent of individuals, women and men equally, get songs stuck in their heads.  It is notable, however, that women must endure them longer and find them more irritating.  And these stuck songs are mostly songs with lyrics, though it is possible for them to be instrumentals as well. There are probable psychological differences between those people stuck with lyrics, and those stuck with pure music.  (But this last statement is simply a logical supposition on my part.)

The songs typically have a high, upbeat melody with repetitive lyrics that verge between catchy and annoying. They may be called earworms, involuntary musical images, brainworms, or sticky music.  Personally, I like the term “earworms.”

A hook is a musical notion.  It is a short riff, passage, or phrase that is used to make a song appealing and to "catch the ear" of the listener.  One definition of a hook is something that stands out and is easily remembered.  Hooks are repetitive, attention-grabbing, and memorable, easily danced to, and have commercial potential.  A hook has also been defined as a "part of a song, sometimes the title or key lyric line, which keeps recurring."  The hook is the foundation of commercial songwriting, if you haven’t already figured this out.

So, crappy songs can become hugely popular, just because they are catchy.  But maybe, if they are catchy, they aren't so crappy after all.  Whatever they are, they are parasites, living in our minds, and seemingly beyond our ability to control them.  They tend to be a smallish portion of a song, more or less reflecting the capacity of one's auditory short-term memory: they are simple tunes of 15 to 30 seconds.  But some people with huge auditory memories get huge earworms.  Some people remember entire symphonies.

Musicians, people with OCD, and probably Second Life DJs are particularly susceptible to these parasitic obsessions.  (I’m not saying they are sick people to begin with… just predisposed.)

So, how does one rid herself of such a parasite?  Some recommend doing a crossword or going for a run.  But these activities are time consuming and are not always convenient.  Another recommendation is singing the British national anthem very slowly.

HOLD ON!!  The British national anthem?  There are at least two that I know of...  Is it "God Save the Queen," or "Land of Hope and Glory"?  AND WAIT!!!  These are both earworms, so much so that each morphed either to or from another earworm - "My Country 'tis of Thee" and "Pomp and Circumstance," respectively.

(Personally, although I'm not British, I'm in the "God Save the Queen" camp.  Part of the second stanza is my favorite patriotic lyric of all time...

                "Confound their politics,

                Frustrate their knavish tricks,

                On Thee our hopes we fix:

                God save us all." 

               

With "Hope and Glory," on the other hand, it's like the whole country is stuck in high school in perpetuity.  I don't know if Austin Powers has weighed in on this issue, but I'm guessing he'd propose "Hard Knock Life.")

WAIT!!  I forgot "Rule, Britannia."  Those Brits DO seem to have a lock on patriotic earworms.  Well, alternatively, you could hum "Deutschland über Alles."

All joking and national anthems aside, the best way to get rid of an earworm is with another earworm.  I have composed a list of my favorite earworms.  I know that research on this subject is widespread, especially among Brits (??), but these are not earworms reported by test subjects.  They are simply MY favorites, in no particular order:

This is Your Night - Amber

Viva La Vida - Coldplay

The Peanut Vendor - Desi Arnaz

Come on, Eileen - Dexys Midnight Runners

The Guns of Navarove - Dmitri Tiomkin

Once upon a Time in the West - Prague Philharmonic

Summer Nights - John Travolta/Olivia Newton John

The Sweetheart Tree - Henry Mancini

Running Wild - Monty Sunshine

Making Love Out Of Nothing At All - Air Supply

Lord of the Dance - Christmas Revels

The Ballad of High Noon (Do Not Forsake Me, O My Darlin') - Tex Ritter

Bear Down, Chicago Bears - The Polar Bears

What is Love (Baby Don't Hurt Me) - Naked Muffin

Crazy - Gnarls Barkley - This Rorschach video might also be helpful, lol  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bd2B6SjMh_w

Negra Macumbe - Tropico Soundtrack (Campillo/Leon Instrumental)

99 Red Balloons - Nena

Right Back Where We Started from - Maxine Nightingale

Sunday Girl - Blondie

Human - The Killers

El Manisero (The Peanut Vendor) - Desi Arnaz (Instrumental)

Crimson and Clover - Joan Jett

Lavender Blue (Dilly Dilly) - Dinah Shore

Any one of these is more or less guaranteed to replace your unwanted earworm, albeit with another, LOL. 

And if none of them work, you can slowly sing "God Save the Queen" or "Land of Hope and Glory" (I don't think either of those work un-slowly, in jig time, though “Rule, Britannia” might), or you can run around the block while doing a crossword.  In any case, I'm sure your ability for uninterrupted meditation will increase dramatically.

                                                                                               

                                                             Sweet Dreams,
                                                             Gudrun

 

Note:  This item also appeared in the April REZ Magazine.