I'd like to think I work better with music on, but I haven't actually tested this. After all, lyrics can be very distracting, new music tends to draw my attention. I had been working mostly with Spotify's Brain Food playlist, but lately there have been three or so songs that just... talk and it was driving me crazy. "Did you hear about the story about the Russian cosmonaut?" (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻
The other day I read an article (who knows which one) that just casually threw out there that listening to one song over and over again increases focus and creativity. There were no links to any research to support this, but I liked the idea so I figured I'd see how it worked for me.
Heads-up, all the links go to YouTube videos of the song in question - so if you click, you may want your headphones on.
I've been listening to Fall Out Boy's You're Crashing, But You're No Wave since I got into the office today and honestly, I don't think I've had as productive a morning in a while. Because I was already familiar with the song, and it has a pretty up-beat rhythm, I've been moving pretty quickly through what I want to get done and the loudness prevents me from getting distracted by conversations around me.
I'll admit that yesterday wasn't such a great day. I started out with "Woman" by Ke$ha, but it has a 5 second talking intro and a bit of an outro, that makes the song loop a lot more obvious and grating after a dozen or so listens. I also tried Saul William's Grippo and the guitar slide intro was better and it worked okay, but didn't quite fade into the background in the same way.
So do I recommend this technique? Is that my productivity hack? Probably. See if it works for you. In the mean time. I don't believe in universal productivity tips anyway, but I do believe in sharing what works for me in case it helps someone else.