Good music for boring data entry

The LandoStander

I keep my Zune on pretty much throughout my work day and aside from an hour's break to listen to the BBC news in the morning it's usually cranking out music to help ease the passage of time and keep me at a decent pace with my data entry.

At present my work playlist is composed of selections from the following albums:

DragonForce: Sonic Firestorm
DragonForce: Inhuman Rampage
All 5 or so Ghost in the Shell albums (just a couple tracks from each)
Transformers Revenge of the Fallen (just a few tracks)
Cowboy Bebop (just a couple tracks)
The Soundtrack to Air Gear
and one track off of Initial D

I'm thinking it may be time to swap out the DragonForce for something a little calmer but still with a pretty quick pace. Is it possible for quick and calm to exist? I'm open to everyone's suggestions.

Chen

Dream Theater - Metropolis Pt 2: Scenes from a Memory

Eat it You Nasty Pig.

Quick and calm exists, it's just fairly rare in rock music. Dream Theater might be what you want (esp. if you like dragonforce) but their catalog is all over the place in terms of speed.

tony_important

The first Mars Volta album is full of calm and quick.
it's called "De-Loused in the Comatorium"
awesome stuff.

Desert_Eagle25

Anything from Nujabes. Crystal Castles is a fun one.

Tav

If you like Dragonforce, then you should probably try some other (better) power metal bands like Blind Guardian, Manowar, Gamma Ray, Stradovarius or Stormwarrior.

Dream Theater are also a really solid suggestion. If you like them, you should also try out some Opeth and Porcupine Tree.

Sir Carcass

Audiobooks

Count Funkula

Future Sound of London: Lifeforms

It's a 2-cd set that consists of a mixture of soundscapes and beats that mix into each other and provide a great background for creative tasks/letting your mind wander.

A sample:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVpWQcLZzIY

Adus

Lot of good suggestions, namely Dream Theater, Blind Guardian, Gamma Ray, Opeth and Porcupine Tree.

It should be noted that Opeth contains some death metal growls, just in case that's not the way you wanted to go. Also Dream Theater and Porcupine Tree experiment with a lot of different styles, so it's completely possible to love one album and dislike another. It seems like fan consensus is usually that Octavarium and Systematic Chaos are poor but I love them. Pretty much any album is good though.

Some others I'd recommend:

Edguy
Iron Maiden
Scar Symmetry
Shadow Gallery
Sonata Arctica
Symphony X
Helloween
Pain of Salvation
Amorphis
Queensrÿche
Muse

Pretty much everything on my last.fm is some type of melodic metal with a couple exceptions.

Spherick

Im going to second Crystal Castles. Amazing music

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGOiIfih8Ls

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56E8yYgLNHE&feature=related

edit: Now with more youtubes!

Mike Danger

The Flashbulb -- Soundtrack to a Vacant Life

This album has gotten me through more boring assignments and slow days at work then I care to remember.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWXLDtgCZP8

jeddy lee

Get anything by "The Go! Team".

XOCentric

Kamelot, tis sweet.

variant

Thrice - Beggars
Thrice - Vheissu

BrotherVoodoo

Wow, I don't even know what to suggest, you want to narrow it down a little?

How bout Ratatat
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBedwedu01k

Maybe Explosions in the Sky
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTw-CwypKdk

Lintilla

Ratatat!

Lintilla

BrotherVoodoo wrote: »

Wow, I don't even know what to suggest, you want to narrow it down a little?

How bout Ratatat
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBedwedu01k

Haha, good call, man!

Nappuccino

You might like God is an Astronaut

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34C41eEpM48&feature=related

65daysofStatic

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1enhv2qtj2E&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAZEcg8NLtM&feature=related

Dredg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6K6kWOs9O0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63APMZC8o7w&feature=channel

Murder By Death

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0B-ENntZVxw&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OPK5PfunNQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OglKsrM5RX8&feature=related

Tav

^If you like the music in the above post, also check out Godspeed You! Black Emperor

Visti

tony_important wrote: »

The first Mars Volta album is full of calm and quick.
it's called "De-Loused in the Comatorium"
awesome stuff.

Seconded.

Also that Blind Guardian album that was about LoTR?

Qingu

You will almost certainly like Iron Maiden, as several people have suggested. Stick to Number of the Beast through Seventh Son of a Seventh Son. They aren't "calm" by a longshot, but I guess they're calmer than Dragonforce...

Calm and fast? Perhaps Muse, which verges into metal territory but just barely. And, this is a stretch based on your taste, you may want to try bands from the "Shoegaze" genre, such as Lush and Ride. They have these dreamy melodies but are actually pretty fast and complex with the drums.

Also on the calm and fast front: Smashing Pumpkins. I don't know how old you are, but "Cherub Rock" is like the anthem of my generation.

Finally, a recommendation on how to enjoy "calm" music. With a lot of these 90's-era alternative bands, the focus of the music is more on the timbre—the overall "texture" of the sound, so to speak—than on the virtuosity of guitar playing. If you can learn to shift the way you listen to music so that you hear the overall way it sounds rather than the succession of individual notes, you will be vastly rewarded. (Pot helps.)

The LandoStander

Thanks for the recommendations.

Dream Theater was a welcomed addition to the playlist today at work. It reminded me of the old point and click adventures/puzzlers a la Myst, 7th Guest etc.

If it really matters a great deal, I'll be 28 next month so I lived through what I think was the original popularity of Smashing Pumpkins and aside from "Tonight Tonight" I really didn't care for them a great deal. As a result of my 'un-coolness' in highschool and I guess in college as well the hole echo-y mind expanding stuff like Radiohead was really lost on me and I never can really get into stuff that usually goes better with a bit of pot and an intro to philosophy class.

The elements I like in things like DragonForce is the emphasis on the guitars. To my perhaps uncultured ears they really feel to me like a continuation of the 80's rock that I found myself enjoying a decade or so late when I realized that the 80's had more to offer than just my love of comic books and Transformers, which I also have songs from the original Transformers movie (the animated one) things like "You've got the Touch" and the Transformer's Theme by White Lion. (Since as a kind under the age of 10 in the 80's I really didn't listen to stuff like Foreigner or White Lion or the Scorpions until after their time had passed somewhat)

I've enjoyed but have never obtained physical copies of stuff from Kamelot, Nightwish and Reign of Fire. The sort of I guess D&D rock. I seem to recall that one Reign of Fire song even has a narration from Christopher Lee for some crazy reason. Pandora isn't allowed at my current place of work and that's how I managed to listen to these selections previously.

I also tend to enjoy just about anything stripped from an anime series that has Yoko Kanno attached to it with an exception I guess for Wolf's Rain. So the jpop/techno angle is one that I tend to enjoy as well. I've also listened to stuff like T.a.T.u (or however it's properly spelled), Fragma and other stuff that's a bit closer to straight techno or club music.

Adus

I think you mean Rhapsody of Fire (formerly just Rhapsody), not Reign of Fire. They have Christopher Lee narrate parts of their album Symphony of Enchanted Lands II. The "crazy reason" being nothing more than them really appreciating his work and wanted to use his voice. He listened to some of their music and agreed to work with them. He even sings on one version of The Magic of the Wizard's Dream.

Sounds like you like melodic metal. A lot on my list is like that. The closest things to Rhapsody, Kamelot and Nightwish would probably be...

After Forever
Angra (The album 'Temple of Shadows' is a must have, at least)
Avantasia
Blind Guardian (for sure)
Dark Moor
Demons & Wizards
Epica
Fairyland (Yes, despite the name, they're quite good)
Falconer
Freedom Call
Luca Turilli and Luca Turilli's Dreamquest (Luca is the guitarist/songwriter for Rhapsody)
Serenity
Six Magics
Stratovarius
Sonata Arctica
Therion

I could go on.

XOCentric

For your listening pleasure, my WIP song list from my power metal selections. Basically whilst I work, I listen to music, because all my work is on the computer. I multitask and make hotmail drafts of songs to keep track of the ones I like. The asterisks are my own rating system, use it how you like, you may find it doesn't fit into your tastes. More asterisks = more goodness, at least to me.

It is MOSTLY melodic "power metal" a.k.a. to me "epic battle metal", some of it.

Enjoy. Spoilered for size (and maybe too much awesome)

Shadow of the beast - pyramaze
The march of the swordmaster - rhapsody*
forever free - stratovarius
super-charger heaven - white zombie**
planet caravan - pantera**
mother - danzig **
Take to the sky - Jag Panzer**
Blood bound - hammerfall*
Riding the eagle - Primal Fear*
riding through hell - heavenly **
Children of lies - almah **


Immortal ones - primal fear
Fly with the black swan - sonata arctica
Cage - Sonata arctica *
4000 rainy nights - Stratovarius
Black Fire - Dragonforce *
Victim of changes - gamma ray ***
Colours of my world - vision divine*
Prophecy - iced earth
Bye bye beautiful - nightwish**
Cry for eternity - Dragonforce *
Demons blood - mystic prophecy
Stronger than all - hammerfall
lost in the void - rage **
Wolf and raven - sonata arctica *
Operation ground pound - Dragonforce *
Blind Evil - Dream Evil
The fire and the fury - firewind **
Soldiers of the wasteland - Dragonforce *
Battlefield - blind guardian *
wicked - symphony X *
Allegiance - firewind *-*
March of mephisto - kamelot*
wasted time - edguy**
Unholy warcry - Rhapsody *
snow - kamelot
when the lights are down - kamelot *
accolade 2 - symphony x *
crimson king - demons & wizards *




Open my grave - rage
Imaginations from the other side - blind guardian
Tommorowland - savage circus


chalice of agony - kai hansen
The phantom opera ghost - iced earth *
Black rain- primal fear**
Angels forgive me - firewind*
Perception of life - brainstorm
Chapter two: keepers of the earth - heavenly*


No sacrifice no victory - hammerfall
pale light of silver moon - falconer
Iron hand - silent force
body breakdown - dragonforce *
Fire! Battle! In Metal! - Dream evil *
Every time it rains - primal fear **
Rocket ride - edguy*
The revealing - iced earth
A new saga begins - rhapsody of fire
Mourning star - Kamelot*
Dethrone tyranny - gamma ray
The watcher - nocturnal rites*
The fourth legacy - Kamelot*
anthem of the world - stratovarius **



New Revelation - Astral Doors
Six Times Dead - Primal Fear
Assault on the shore - Fairyland
Last night on earth - Revolution Renaissance
It won't fade - Sonata Artica
Ride the storm - Silent wave
Crimson rider - master plan
Ready to strike - firewind *
The black halo - kamelot *
Fury of the wild - hammerfall
Never forgotten heroes - rhapsody
Twilight of the Gods - Helloween
Anima mundis - dionysus
Black diamond -stratovarius *
The secret of life - vision divine
Sleipnir - manowar
Dead to the world - nightwish ***
Dawn of victory - iron fire *
Melancholy - iced earth *
Call out to the world - nocturnal rites *
Ghost opera - kamelot **