Comments on: What Does YOUR Exam Playlist Look Like?

By: ezeman200x

ezeman200x — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 05:31:18 +0000

Myleene Klass Radio is my Pandora Station for studying. British pianist. No lyrics.

By: M

Sun, 13 Dec 2009 04:36:23 +0000

I am all about Koop. It’s freaking fantastic. They’re an electronic jazz band from Sweden, and their music is just so ideal to hum along along to while typing away.

And I also like a variety of French indie music…but I think that’s a symptom of being Canadian and having gone to French Immersion schools for most of my life…

By: Angry Sam

Angry Sam — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 03:17:40 +0000

I’ve been listening to a mix of albums that bounce between higher-energy and ambient “concentrating” music.

Do Make Say Think – Goodbye Enemy Airship
Talking Heads – Remain in Light
Jay-Z – Blueprint III
godspeed you! black emperor – Lift Yr. Skinny Fists
Kid Koala – Some of My Best Friends Are DJs
Miles Davis – Sketches of Spain
Pixies – Doolitte
Ornette Coleman – Sound Grammar
TV on the Radio – Return to Cookie Mountain

By: ouij

ouij — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:12:17 +0000

@Scott, is it because it’s Baroque that you don’t understand the words, or because the words are in languages you don’t speak?

By: ouij

ouij — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:41:59 +0000

@Joshua Auriemma: Think out of the box when it comes to composers, too. Philip Glass’s “Solo Piano” album is good, as is his soundtrack to “The Hours.” Terry Riley’s “In C” is postmodern, loopy, and backgroundy. John Adams is also fantastic–”Grand Pianola Music,” “The Dharma at Big Sur,” and “The Chairman Dances” (this last a suite from fragments written around the time of his “Nixon in China” opera score)

I’d put Gavin Bryars on here, too, but his best-known work involves a tape loop of someone singing, which might be too distracting.

By: ouij

ouij — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 05:11:23 +0000

@Sean McGilvray, you mean the Jaydiohead mash-up album? Got that, too. Incidentally, for anyone cramming for Criminal Procedure, I should note that the second verse of Jay-Z’s “99 Problems” is the BEST quick review of Fourth Amendment search & seizure EVER. If you can name all the cases he’s talking about, you’re totally ready for finals.

Also, I totally forgot to mention online streaming audio. Last.fm’s “UK Garage” tag–not garage as in “garage band,” but the upbeat, syncopated two-step dance grooves. And for background ambiance, Soma.fm’s “cliqhop” station can’t be beat.

By: Sean McGilvray

Sean McGilvray — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 01:47:13 +0000

Those are some great suggestions. Pandora and Last.fm have definitely been my friends.

@scott, I have found that baroque is the best classical choice. I’ve mostly been listening to that tag station.

Occasionally, I’ll listen to the Tycho station, really mellow electronic music. And NIN Ghosts is appropriately bleak and distressing.

@ouij, Somewhere out there there’s a Jay-Z/Radiohead mashup, with instrumental versions for all of us easily distracted types.

@MS,@John, So what do the “game day” mixes look like? I think I need some Queen or something equally jock-ish to get in a victory or death mind set that some final require.

By: ouij

ouij — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 01:01:25 +0000

My Exam Playlist (in no particular order)–mostly albums.

Jay-Z, Blueprint 3
Radiohead: OK Computer, Kid A, Amnesiac
Nick Drake, Five Leaves Left
Glenn Gould: Goldberg Variations, Bach 2- and 3- part inventions
Crystal Method, Vegas

By: MS

MS — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 00:23:58 +0000

Oh man! My old pandora playlists weren’t doing it for me today as I studied for Evidence, so I Google searched “best pandora playlist for studying”. Bam–fourth on the list I get not only music for studying, but studying for law school finals! How about that!

Explosions in the Sky, Imogen Heap and Zero 7 are all PERFECT for me! Thanks guys!

@John, I do that too! Except I listen to some of my “pump-up” songs while watching some videos of amazing soccer goals on youtube. I feel like it shifts my nerves from the pre-exam type to the pre-competition type, which I handle better.

By: Pscrawfo

Pscrawfo — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:55:06 +0000

Pink Floyd: Animals, Dark Side of the Moon, Relics, Wish You Were Here. Play them through straight, and then take a break from studying. Then start again.