I had some fun with some writing yesterday. A friend of mine is planning out a book and gave me a couple of themes. Generally is about time travel to old music gigs.
I thought I'd give it a spin with my brainstorming technique for plot line. I'm more a 'pantser' than a planner (ie write by the seat of my pants etc).
Anyway, I thought of a few titles that could be relevant to the theme, as well as trying to add in something to drive the listless protagonist.
It was such fun I thought I'd write it down...
Here are a few whimsical and eclectic songs I used to stimulate thought.
Cat crept in – Mud
Schrödinger’s Cat. Obviously. Within you and without you. Paradox. Constellation with Noomi Rapace not realising the quantumness of everything after an ISS impact with a corpse.
Time – Bowie
An obvious choice, although I had to think of these. I didn't want to use Mr. Google and the 'sniper in the brain came' to me and I thought, 'Perfect. Slow bullet wound affecting brain' but then I remembered the TV show Life on Mars and others.
Drugs don’t work – Verve/Richard Ashcroft
Could be drugged and hallucinating? Entirely possible if a big fan. Add that the drugs don’t really work and you have a split.
American idiot - Green Day – Gogol
Reminds me of the amazing Diary of a Madman by Gogol, which takes Poprishchin and follows him on a path to madness. First person. The entries haphazardly mix a past tense recounting of events of the day with present time registering of thoughts and associations relating to them. It begins with a standard date-based diary format, but at a certain point even the dates take on an irrational form, as if the writer's sense of conventional time has dissolved.
I will follow you into the dark. Death cab for cutie
At the borders of life and death. Seen and done it all. Except these last few things.
Teardrop. Massive attack
Mirrors are a powerful tool. Faithful mirrors especially so.
Girlfriend in a coma. Morrisey and Marr/ Smiths/ Coupland
Young, gifted and Black re-imagined by gloom rockers. More significantly, Douglas Coupland writes a modern fairy tale of Karen who predicts her lapse into a coma and stays in it for 17 years, awakening in time for the End of the World. Brilliant use of Jared as a ghost narrator. Style is grounded in realism.
Bad dream hotline - FOE
Use of a Dream trap. Go figure.
idontwanttobeyouanymore – Billy Eilish
She took a long cold look at me (Syd). Generate the mood. Gravity of it can’t escape the fate.
Jesus wept - Sia. (God shaped hole)
Playing with divinity. Use of a God construct? “Life is a cigarette / Cinder, ash and fire / Some smoke it in a hurry / Others savour it". And ‘I smoke my friends down to the filter.’ 2.5 billion heartbeats= average lifespan. ('God shaped hole' is in Smashing Pumpkins lyrics also)
21st century schizoid man. King Crimson.
Being manipulated Terry Gillam’s Brazil-style and powerless to escape the chosen route. Nondeterminism: the doctrine that there are factors other than the state and immutable laws of the universe involved in the unfolding of events, such as free will.
My song choices generated ideas incorporating:
- · Schrödinger’s Cat
- · Bullet in Brain
- · Drugs and Hallucinations
- · The madness is creeping over me
- · Borderline of death
- · Mirror concepts
- · Coma
- · Ghost narrator
- · Dream trap
- · Mood Gravity & Love
- · Divine friends
- · Determinism and non-determinisim
No comments:
Post a Comment