UKC

Just some low-key market research. 

What kind of music do people prefer in climbing walls?

Is there a difference between what is preferred by new/social climbers versus people in for serious training? (Though in my experience the ones in training rooms are often earphone-d up)

John Cage's "4:33" on repeat would be a good choice .....

Jive Bunny does Mahler.

There will never be consensus on this.  What I like will always be different to what others like.

I think the best compromise is a mixture of old and new stuff.  And avoid a single genre all night long.

Ideally none. But there again I am weird as it seems to be the thing that everything these days must be done with accompanying music. Somehow it seems to be impossible to climb something without accompanying noise (encouragement from mates is fine) or indeed run, lift weights, swim, row, shop, drink, eat etc. Sometimes quiet is good for the mind.

ps I love me music especially live!

The Sound of Silence

Meh.

Thanks for the learning opportunity. Had to look up “meh”. It’s not a phrase I will need to use if I understand the meaning correctly.

Meh

Pop Jr all the way.

none, especially not the rubbish they pipe out at Transition extreme.

Techno, loud*, and lots of it.

*Bit quieter if its a lead wall so you can hear your partner. Although ideally simultaneously loud enough to drown out all the old codgers complaining about music.

FTFY

I once overheard Staff grumbling that Management had created a list of outlawed tunes. Apparently Toto - Africa was the one that did it.
 

No idea what else they’d played, but you can imagine the incandescent rage building as he finally blew his top by the end of the synth intro.

Shame really.

To an extent, background music can actually useful to make things seem quieter - classic example being quiet music in a restaurant which turns all the chatter into more of a white noise.

Would be curious if a gym feels "louder" without music, or with moderate volume music.

Personally, I'm not that fussy on music - but for general consensus, nothing too extreme like gabba, or black metal, and nothing with explicit lyrics (when kids are present anyway). 

Americans whooping and shouting things like 'Rad! Siick! You got this!' on a 20 second loop

"Ride the send train, broseph!"

😫

I quite like progressive house with a nice bassline. Keeps me "into it".  I did a lot of bouldering at TCA Bristol, where one of the staff was into DJ mixes etc & could usually be relied on for decent soundtrack. 

Between the Trees soundtrack on loop. 

It's not the kind of thing you get on Radio 4, just boom boom boom, what about an episode of The Archers? And anyway, why do those young people have to listen to their music so loud?

Sounds good. TCA Newsroom used to be good now its shit from the 80s I didn't like first time around.

It was down to one staff member who probably works at the Prop Store.

All death metal. All the time. 

Ideally maximum use of explicit lyrics for a child-free wall

prefer songs for the deaf, you can't even hear them.

I'd say sound tracking a climbing wall is the same as being the office DJ, you want an extensive playlist (to avoid repetition) with a variety of genres and styles, nothing too extreme, nothing too offensive (think of the kids!)

But also not too boring and obvious... Throw a few curveballs in there and let people hear something they might not have heard before.

That way you hope that most people will enjoy at least something on there, and you'll never have to subject someone to something they hate for too long.

This is the playlist I made for my office (that I no longer work in) https://open.spotify.com/playlist/14LDY8f7L1krp3vndweVtJ?si=a2954868c733432... a lot of the stuff in there I'd never listen to at home, but I'm cool with it being on in the office.

Recording of sheep, lapwings, rooks, curlews, ringed ousel, running water, wind, rain, thunder, goats, cows, old McDonald telling you to go away.. .  

...neds / scallies playing happy hardcore, shouting and screaming. Cars racing by on the nearby road...

Climbing anywhere near Glasgow!

Worst experience of music has got to be Ed Sheeran accompanied by the owner of the Ed Sheeran playing boombox singing along to Ed in a whiny nasal flat voice.

Country and western just to see the look of despair on almost everyones face.

Or,as per others, either nothing or a decent mix played low enough so not to annoy.

As you say anyone who really wants music to get into the mood can wear headphones and pleasing everyone is impossible.

I thought there was a law that climbing walls can only play drum and bass, or is that just first thing on a sunday morning?

I can't stand up for falling down by Elvis Costello maybe?

Down the wall i prefer nice simple techno.. just feels non-intrusive & keeps the energy up i feel

IMO headphones in the wall are generally a bad idea - block out far more of your awareness of your surroundings than simple background music.

"I move like a cat, talk like a rat, sting like a bee,

Babe I wanna be your man

My head says:

"I'd say sound tracking a climbing wall is the same as being the office DJ, you want an extensive playlist (to avoid repetition) with a variety of genres and styles, nothing too extreme, nothing too offensive (think of the kids!)

But also not too boring and obvious... Throw a few curveballs in there and let people hear something they might not have heard before.

That way you hope that most people will enjoy at least something on there, and you'll never have to subject someone to something they hate for too long."

But my heart says:

"All death metal. All the time."

I prefer no music.

They once put on deeply offensive jingly Christmas music at Ratho weeks before Christmas. My grade dropped to about 6b+. I was so pissed off that I complained. I must have looked quite angry because they changed it.

Do you mean ALL Christmas music is offensive and jingly, or that they managed to find especially offensive and jingly Christmas music and only played that?

(struggling to think of inoffensive non-jingly Christmas music)

Handel's Messiah?

😂

I'm chuckling to myself imagining that playing at the wall

The latter.

The hallelujah chorus would work quite well for a good send.

I’m currently playing The Slits’ version of Heard It Through The Grapevine a lot, probably far too much. But its joyous, energetic and bouncy!

“Are Friends Egyptian” (YouTube) is a good choon too…

The problem of gaining consensus on this type of issue is that my taste in music is significantly more advanced than most other people

Anything as long as it's not on a loop, and quiet enough that you can tune it out if it's not your thing.   Anything that is loud enough to be dominant is not welcome.  Silence is often pleasant - just a murmur of voices.   With the occasional gunshot if there is a screaming kids' party or the summary execution of anyone saying rad, send it or dude

I have a strong and unpleasant memory of a month in which Mile End only seemed to be playing the same reggae Christmas album on loop….

Or goody, (yet) another anti US post.  How'd you feel about places outside of the UK being so unwelcoming to Brits as to jokingly saying they should be shot if heard speaking english?  You'd think you'd be trying to keep what few international friends you have in the current circumstances, but no let's raise the Union Jack, cheer British exceptionalism, and Carry on Sneering.  And, let's face it, without kids parties there'd be no walls.

Don't misunderestimate how the UK values how much America has contributed to the language that separates us

Tricky thing, the internet. Taking everything you read as a literal and firmly held belief of the author is generally a mistake. Which of course presents me with a conundrum. I’ll leave you to work out what that is and which way I’m inclining.  

The key word is "jokingly". But then, of course, you don't do humour, even of the affectionate variety.

The sound track to the shower scene in "Psycho". By way of encouragement you understand.

If they'd play John Lee Hooker's "Boom Boom Boom Boom" and it's like I might one day go to a climbing wall.

All depends how po-faced they are. 

The problem we have is that we are discussing this with our sense of humour but you are on such a different wavelength that your interpretation is roughly the opposite of what we (well most of us) meant. What we intend as good natured teasing humour at the "so sick bro!" "totally legit" Americanism you interpret as hostility and anti US, actually it's irreverent and quasi affectionate. This is where the phrase "two nations separated by a common language" comes from.

As a serious suggestion you should either stop frequenting UK dominated forums - a bad option and it'd be a shame for you to go. Or chill the **** out and try to learn about our irreverent humour. The vast majority of the UK likes Americans, your interpretation is backwards.

Of course, the John Lee Hooker classic "Solid Sender" was dedicated to a keen climber friend of the great bluesman who could be relied upon to dispatch his ascents with alacrity and aplomb, as we like to say in English.

I prefer instrumental stuff as I find that lyrics interfere with my concentration more. Lyrics in languages I don't understand seem to work too which I've also found for study. I've always loved the music in the Works (quite varied, a lot of DnB, dancy chill out, and some reggae) and one day was pleasantly surprised when they started cranking out some Colombian Cumbia out of the blue, really made my day. BUK seems to have more of an indie/rock vibe going on, which although I like, is not so good to climb to IMHO especially if you're tempted to sing along  . I'm so glad that walls generally tend to steer away from pop. 

There's a PHD hiding in all this somewhere.

Techno? Is that the music that sounds like an OCD chimpanzee  beating an oil drum with a stick?

I prefer dustbin full of baseball bats falling down stairs techno but hey each to their own 

Booyakasha!

When I and my pensioner mates turn up on quiet mornings the local wall normally changes the music to 60s classic rock, presumably in the belief that everyone thinks the popular music of their teenage years is the best ever made.

Personally, I'd prefer the sort of stuff I like to blast out from my Bluetooth speaker when I'm at the crag, a nice mix of Schoenberg and Stockhausen. The only time I ever turn it down is when I want to shout unwanted beta at strangers.

You're too old, let go, it's over.

Ha!

well tbf my actual tastes are far more extreme & most likely not suited to climbing walls. I find ‘nice simple techno’ f*cking dull when not at the wall.. but for some reason it works for climbing, probably coz it just chugs along in a non-intrusive way..

Re ‘too old’ tho.. techno is huge at the mo.. but maybe you’re too old to know that

I find there are a lot of things that work and only few that don't. Techno, D&B, especially liquid D&B, metal, classic rock, synth wave, general electronics, even cheesy 00's trance all keep energy up. What doesn't work and should be avoided at all costs is radio friendly pop, completely the wrong vibe for any climbing wall.

Get the Led Zeppelin out and watch the projects get sent 

there's enough man made noise in the world.  What about  just the sound of voices and exertion?

If you have to ahve anything it could be Eric Whiteacre's Deep Field as an aid to contemplation

Because it's *ucking annoying (to some of us anyway).  And aren't those, by definition, person made?

I was pleasantly amazed at the Substation in Macc a while back when they played Patti Smith's version of Gloria, off Horses.  It reminded me of something I hadn't heard for decades (and now play a lot) - Patti Smith never goes out of fashion.

Does somebody need a cuddle?

The sound of a West Cumbrian shouting "send it dude" is equally as ridiculous as a Texan calling you "Marra". Like, eh. 

I would appreciate any of JS Bach's harpsichord concertos.

This'll work for me:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tE41XRIArH4&ab_channel=Accidentalist

In all honesty, walls need to play more Death Metal. It's good for the psych.

Andy F

exertion can be very quiet.  and it is not at all annoying to hear people communicating with their partners?  Within reason?  I can only deduce the dislikers just can't stand other climbers speaking to each other!   *ucking - really!

dislikers want sign language only I suppose but that doesn't work unless both parties are watching each other's gestures - not exactly practical.

I fail to see your logic - in fact you are in error.

You know I reckon anywhere where people work for long shifts, doing (generally) pretty straightforward work for a pretty low wage (we’re talking shops, restaurants, pubs, climbing walls etc) the music is more for the benefit of the staff rather than punters…

Worked in retail years ago, and having literally ANY music was better than silence, which just made the shift seem twice as long.

Not if you hate it. Totally distracting to the point of being enragingly annoying.

There is absolutely no solution to this problem, because music is so intensely personal and almost completely orthogonal to climbing. The usual solution is to try to find something inoffensive, but while this works with other aesthetic compromises (food, design, blah blah), it doesn't work with music because bland music is the most offensive of all. I really don't like death metal, I know nothing about it and wouldn't have any idea what was 'good' death metal and what was 'crap' death metal, it has zero appeal to me as a genre - but I'd still rather hear that than Coldplay.

Last night I was going to comment that I prefer any music other than what the Arkose gyms in Paris play (Blink 182, Green day, various other shite). However I was at Pont de Sèvres today and it was excellent. ATCQ, Public Enemy, Amadou et Miriam, Bob, etc Well done them.

A fair comment. I was slightly tongue in cheek, but personally I do prefer the crunch of a guitar to the relentless repetitive thump of dance music. It's all horses for courses.

Andy F