Writing and music are very important to me. Both open the doors to worlds of emotion, imagination, and exploration of themes big and small; sometimes I use certain music to help me write, and sometimes I feel so strongly about a song that I try to write something to try to share those feelings with the reader. (the opening scene of Broken Stars, for example, is inspired by Undisclosed Desires by Muse, one of my favorite songs)

That link is not lost to the M:EM: we all love razor's musical contributions, and I remember Tevish linking a song in relation to a Taramir piece, which unfortunately I can't find with a quick search. So I'd like to hear more about how the writing-music relationship works for you.

It might be a Tumblr thing, but I'm familiar with people making playlists inspired by some fictional work, character or (relation)ship, and after hearing and being blown away by the ones dedicated by the talented and lovely Toastyhat to her own characters in War in the Shade, her awesome webcomic, I wanted to try it too!
The results are the following Spotify playlists:
To Set a Heart Ablaze: Sharaka's playlist is the biggest right now, which may not seem much when speaking about 12 songs, but I'm awfully picky.
Halfway Nowhere: Elphimas' is 7 songs long, and focuses mostly on their post-amnesia personality.
Smithing a War: Jack's playlist is also 7 songs long, despite their significantly smaller presence in my stories. I just had a lot of appropriate songs at my disposal, I guess.

So, in addition to hear about your take on the relationship between writing and music, I'd be glad to know whether there are certain songs that come into mind when thinking about a character, story or plane, yours or otherwise, and if some songs have inspired you to come up with something we had the pleasure of reading in the M:EM.

For me, the most obvious connection is when I write a story or a poem that is directly inspired by a song or by multiple songs. I suspect I have done this more than anyone around here, although Orcish shamelessly stole the idea from me (that will bring him around to defend himself, right? ) so I know a number of his pieces are based off of songs.

The first piece that I remember writing based off of a song was way back in college in a creative writing class. The story was basically a rekindling of a past relationship, but things sort of don't add up, and in the end it was one of those "But it was all a dream!" stories. Instead of a dream, though, it was a psychotic delusion, and the protagonist was revealed at the end to be in an institution, listening to the radio. That story had the elements of several different songs woven into it, the implication being that his mind was picking out bits of the songs he was hearing and constructing his reality around those bits.

Around here, the first story I wrote directly inspired by a song was "Showdown," which gave us Antine. And although that story itself will never be canon, I was happy with the way that came together as a re-imagining of the Beatles' song "Rocky Raccoon."

A bit later on, following the tradition of Jakkard stories being based on songs (with "Showdown" and Orcish's "Love and Theft"), I wrote "Seven Spineless Angels" (or "Steven Spineless Ageless," according to Lord Luna). This was based on a song by Ray Charles and Willie Nelson called "Seven Spanish Angels" and gave us good ol' Sage.

My story "Promises, Promises," which is a back-and-forth story about Thatis and Symparu, is based on two different songs. Thatis's section is based on Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' song "American Girl," playing off the fact that she is from Ameran. So, I guess, she's an Ameran girl... Symparu's half of the story was inspired by the song "Sweet Child o' Mine" by Guns N' Roses. That story was really fun to write, trying to fit those two songs together in a coherent way.

The story "Unmasking at Midnight," which introduced Henri le Douce, Aurélie Cerveau, and really the entire Thorneau Revolution plot, was heavily inspired by the song "Ballroom Blitz" by Sweet. That song set in motion one of the longest and most involved plots we have in the M:EM, which is...interesting.

My Oldwalker story "Tales of the Dominia Cabal: Lucien" returns to my Beatles-inspired roots by repurposing their song "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds." While much of pre-ravaged Pythdon is based on elements of the song, the primary inspiration lies with Lucien himself. He is, literally, Lucien, the Sky-Width Diamonds.

My recent story, "The Spell Trader," is also based on a song, although I don't want to say which one yet. When Orcish returns, I'd like to see if he spots it (he will absolutely spot it...)

So that's a snapshot of my take on the interconnectivity of music and my writing. It's possible that I have missed a few stories based on songs, but these are the ones I remember.

I did! The song in question is "Further", specifically a cover I first encountered in the indie game Iji and still prefer to the original.

Lourima Viiran's backstory was inspired by the sound, feel, and somewhat lyrics of "Viimesen Kerran", a fact that I believe is forever recorded in her dossier as a useless little bit of trivia.