Music I Write To.

Four tracks that 'influenced' writing The Cost.

A few months ago, I was asked by Ruth Matheson at Lomond Radio to submit four tracks that influenced me while working on The Cost. This is what I sent her.

‘Ruth, I had my first book published back in 2009. I’m now on book 12 with The Cost, the first in a new crime series set in the northeast of Scotland, out now. The sequel, The Fracture, is due out in November, both are published by Severn House. But long before I was published, I wrote, and wrote, and wrote – short stories, unpublished novels, unfinished novels. I also worked my way through university with an honours in marketing, then, later in life, an MBA.

And pen in hand, or laptop on lap, I wrote anywhere and everywhere (I once wrote an entire novel on a series of transatlantic flights). And, with every stroke of the pen or click of the keyboard, I’ve had music in the background. From trance dance to sixties crooners, from Finnish electronica to 80’s greatest hits – I write with music on, and loud. It’s my way of shutting out the world and losing myself in my writing. The fact that, in my downtime, I attend a shedload of live music events might explain my tinnitus.

Now, if I’m honest, Blake Glover, my new protagonist, is the same age as me. He also comes from Fraserburgh (as did my dad), was a policeman (as was my dad) and has some of my music taste. The four tracks he might choose/I listened to when I was writing were:

Artist: Romy
Track: Weightless

From the album Mid Air – my favourite album of the last year. A single that speaks to disbelief when you finally find love - not to hang around, go grab what is in front of you - and a magical song to dance to. A breathless voice over a light trance beat and a wonderful melody. This reflects that inner part of me that says there is no yesterday, or tomorrow – just today – and you need to act that way – something that Blake realises he hasn’t done.

Artist: OMD
Track: Electricity

This could have been any track from the band. I first saw them at the Glasgow
College of Technology in 1980 and I’ve seen them way too many times from
Glasgow to Madrid and onto LA – I even had tickets to see them in Melbourne
(but having just spent seven weeks visiting my daughter I couldn’t justify
returning for the gig). OMD all started for me with Electricity – and that’s the
track I choose, as would Blake, when on a nostalgia trip.

Artist: Mark Germino
Track: Rex Bob Lowenstein

I heard this track on a wet Saturday afternoon in 1987 and fell in love. This is a song about wanting to be set free to do what you love. The story features a DJ who will play anything that is requested, before, one day, his radio station is taken over by a corporate giant who wants to move all DJs to a playlist format. Rex’s reaction – he locks himself in the studio and trashes the place – and, in the end, Rex is put in front of a judge who sentences him, but not before the judge thanks Rex for playing his favourite track the day before. Blake sometimes feels like trashing the place, as do I.

Artist: Villa Nah
Track: Some Kind of Dream

I saw this band in 2010 as support to OMD in Glasgow. The power behind this band is Juho Paalosmaa from Finland. Squeezed into the space between the fire curtain and the front of the stage the band (just two of them) blew me away – and Some Kind of Dream was the standout track for me. I’ve since been in touch with Juho and he once took one of my books on stage at a festival in Finland - and sent me the photo. And dreaming of a better life is Blake’s motivation in the new book.’