R to the E to the A & D — It’s reading week darlings! That means we can kick our feet up, throw away the textbooks & watch every episode of every show we’ve PVRed in the past month of CRAZINESS!!!! Kick back, relax and dedicate this long weekend to yourself!
Although I know we all want to avoid anything that screams school this upcoming week, I suggest those textbooks get taken out of our bags (at least a few times) before we head back. It will be October 15th faster than we know and we’ll soon be showering in assignments. I swear it’s like they’re handed out in bulk! Anywho, I’m here to share some musical tips – in study form.
I’ve decided there are three types of songs that one can listen to when doing work:
The Silent Movie
When I read, I can’t have a catchy song playing in the background as it entirely sidetracks my brain. Even when I don’t mean to, I find myself singing along. If you often feel that way, choose a song that has zero lyrics & is entirely instrumental. A good thing to search for is a movie soundtrack — I’ve seen a ton of Harry Potter & Atonement stuff like this. My #personalfave for the silent song category is The Violet Hour by The Civil Wars. It’s calm and soft, but not so chill that I’ll fall asleep. Whatever you chose make sure it’s something you actually enjoy listening too & something that won’t be a huge distraction.
[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/21662564″ iframe=”true” /]
The Slow Song
I am a huge advocate of slow songs. So naturally, if I’m going to play a song when I’m doing work, I like to chose something slower. It’s still easy to bob my head to, but I’m not dancing around my room. This can sometimes throw off my reading though, since I’m easily distracted. Knowing that I get distracted easily, I like to play this kind of music when I’m re-typing hand written notes, or working on a more visual assignment. My favourite song for this section is Big Jet Plane by Angus & Julia Stone.
[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/2043816″ iframe=”true” /]
The New Song
Since songs I know get me singing, someone once suggested that I get a friend to make me a playlist of songs I don’t know. I thought this was genius! Instead of getting a friend to do it, since I share a lot of mutual favourites with them, I pulled the friend card on 8tracks — It let’s me type in any word from ‘study’ to ‘slow’ to ‘essay’ to ‘indie’ and all this music pops up. It’s super exciting & let’s you can study to a playlist you’ve never heard before. The benefit of this is that you probably won’t know the words to the songs, yet you’re studying experience will still be quickly enhanced. Have you heard this song? Night Bus by Lucy Rose – If not, take a listen! I love Lucy Rose’s songs for for studying – and all of her music in general.
[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/38001084″ iframe=”true” /]
Warning: I often find myself loving a song on these unknown playlists and googling/youtubing artists instead of doing work. To prevent this from happening WHILE you’re studying — grab a piece of paper and jot down the songs you like so you can research it later.
If you’ve never heard of 8tracks and were confused by that last option, I suggest you go & give it a look. It is essentially a site where people create playlists for everything (getting ready, running, studying, partying, cuddling etc.) and you can listen to them for free. It’s been my best friend for a while now. I love it for studying, working out & just for every day stuff. I also find it wonderful as a way to discover new songs & artists. Here is one of my personal favourite playlists to get you started!
Now that you have some songs to guide you through reading week, try and get some work done! Obviously don’t lock yourself in your room all week doing every assignment in advance, but catch up on what you’ve missed, re-read notes to refresh your brain and even start researching for upcoming assignments. Do your best to stay on track so you’re not up late, living on coffee the night before, just to finish what you totally could have done/started during reading week.
I hope this has inspired you to find the perfect song for your studying habits! Share your #personalfave study song with us through comments or via twitter: @RUStudentLife – we always love hearing what you have to say.
I wish you a happy thanksgiving and a whole lot of comfy sleep-ins!
