Brazenly Background: Steve Gunn’s ‘Music for Writers’ and the Radical Possibilities for Intentional Functional Music
Written while listening to John Renbourn’s The Lady and the Unicorn (1970)
While skimming recent Wire reviews, I stumbled upon Steve Gunn’s new release, Music for Writers. I instantly gravitated towards the concept, a clear play on Brian Eno’s Ambient 1: Music for Airports album from 1979. Not only did it seem that Gunn was toying with the notion of self-aware functional music — background music made with intention — but it was also geared towards my practice of writing. Gunn hit the nail on the head when he decided that those out there who need background music most of all are writers. As a writer who does work with music in the background almost every work session, excluding time-crunch moments where my focus can only be served by pure silence, I found the notion intriguing that Gunn turned his attention towards this particular group of background music listeners. It also caused me to reflect on my own usage of functional music for my craft, its implications, and what it is about the art of writing that begs for something in the background.
Written while listening to Bobbi Humphrey’s Blacks and Blues (1974)
Earlier this year, I wrote about Liz Pelly’s Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist, and have referenced back to that book numerous times since (I think I can venture that it was one of the most significant books I read this year). A notable aspect of Pelly’s book is the concept of background music and the lean-back listener, someone who passively engages with Spotify and its playlists, allowing their algorithmic recommendations to steer their music listening experience, instead of actively seeking out certain albums and artists. Pelly asserts that Spotify creates an environment in which all music can become background music, and that Spotify takes advantage with playlists padded with generic, “neo-Muzak” recorded by ghost artists who don’t really exist.
In the wake of Pelly’s book, as well as due to other factors, I feel that there is a current anxiety around background music and passive listening, which I also believe is entirely justified. All of these reasons contribute to why Steve Gunn’s Music for Writers fascinates me. When background music is almost vilified at this time, a celebrated artist in indie music releases a record brazenly branded as intended for the background. What I think Gunn understands is that to some degree, creating music for the background or for a function, is not inherently bad, and that there is also beauty in music that is carefully crafted for this purpose.
Written while listening to Boards of Canada’s Music Has the Right to Children (1998)
Brian Eno’s Ambient 1: Music for Airports often comes up in discussion surrounding the difference between Muzak and other forms of generic background music, and music for the background that is more intentional. Eno crafted Ambient 1 as a replacement for Muzak in tense spaces such as airports, and in doing so, pioneered an entire genre of music that, in his words for Ambient 1’s liner notes, is “as ignorable as it is interesting.” His liner notes also serve as a thesis statement surrounding ambient music and its distinction from Muzak. Eno wrote, “The connotations that [Muzak] carries are those particularly associated with the kind of material that Muzak Inc. produces – familiar tunes arranged and orchestrated in a lightweight and derivative manner. Understandably, this has led most discerning listeners (and most composers) to dismiss entirely the concept of environmental music as an idea worthy of attention. Over the past three years, I have become interested in the use of music as ambience, and have come to believe that it is possible to produce material that can be used thus without being in any way compromised.” Today, I think we are reaching a similar crossroads that Eno discussed, where composers and listeners are beginning to reject the concept of background music as homogenized and derivative — and while it can be, Eno proved, and now Steve Gunn reminds us, that it doesn’t have to be.
In the Wire review of Music for Writers, Lucy Thraves wrote, “Since Brian Eno’s Ambient 1: Music for Airports, the idea of music as accompaniment to all manner of activities or places has been gradually commodified into oceans of AI-generated slop – ‘Lo-fi Hip Hop Beats to Revise To’ and so on. Which is why it’s a relief to be reminded that music can be written for a specific activity while retaining its musical integrity.” I couldn’t agree more, and when I learned about Music for Writers, I also immediately thought of the bland YouTube mixes that are peddled online, captioned meet any writing, studying, and reading situation. For some reason, algorithmic recommendations believe that the most insipid and unimaginative tracks are what writers want for creating art through the written word. I researched to see whether Music for Writers was included on any streaming service playlists, and did find that it appears on Apple Music’s “Pure Ambient” and “New Age and Beyond,” and that when I searched for Music for Writers on Spotify, the top result was Spotify’s “Music for Writing” playlist, which ironically did not include anything from Music for Writers.
The inclusion (and not) of Gunn’s record on these playlists sends me conflicting messages: on the one hand, I find peace in knowing that Apple Music fills their playlists with diligently composed ambient music by real artists, but I also see an irony in including Gunn on the very playlists that have played a role in degrading background music. Nonetheless, Gunn not only resists allowing background music to fall into disrepair by intentionally crafting a record for background listening that one can actively seek out instead of falling into lean-back listening, he provides writers with music that inspires creativity and honors the tradition of ambient music as intentional, functional music.
Written while listening to Steve Gunn’s Music for Writers (2025)
You may have noticed my little headings throughout this entry, which I decided to add in about halfway through the writing process, capturing snapshots of the albums I selected to have as background music for my writing sessions. Recently, I’ve been increasingly using my record collection for background listening while I write instead of streaming, an experiment partially born out of my desire to cut back streaming and listen to my records more, and partially as an experiment to observe how I may work differently or the same by switching this routine. Since college, I have written and studied to background music, a practice that became as second nature to the writing process as revising and editing. As I stated earlier, the only times I write in silence are when I need to focus beyond all imagination, or when I am editing (I edit by reading out loud).
Even before I started to become more aware of passive listening as a theoretical concept, I have always had tiny, subconscious pangs of guilt for relegating my favorite music to the role of background, like I was disrespecting the album by ignoring it. I often do not select functional music like Gunn’s, which is intended for background, but mostly I put on old favorites that I know inside and out, so there are no surprises and I can find comfort in working with them on, like wrapping yourself in a worn-in, cozy office sweater. When I think of my choices in background music through this perspective, I find my practice beautiful and indicative of my admiration for those records.
Now that this blog is wrapping up and my writing process for this week is coming to a close, I notice a few trends and observations about my background listening throughout this time. The music I gravitated towards was primarily instrumental, and were confined to the folk, jazz, and electronic genres. I couldn’t help but realize that those genres, especially jazz and electronic, are often cited as genres whose artists are marginalized in current Spotify focus and relaxation playlists, as their spots on those playlists are being filled by ghostwritten content. There are aspects of these genres that are suited for focus, and it doesn’t surprise me that both Music for Airports and Music for Writers touches upon these genres. And while I hadn’t consciously considered this idea while I selected these records for my writing sessions, I do recall looking for records that would create an atmosphere in my home.
I have often preferred streaming while I write almost solely because my turntable is in the living room, away from my desk. However, I have discovered a new joy in hearing the sounds of my records spinning faintly from the other room, little wisps capturing my attention here and there, but ultimately creating a sense of space as if that room is equally as alive with inspiration as my tucked away desk is. The living room sits at the center of my home, and it feels like my turntable pours vitality out from that center into every corner.
Even though the distant music aided my focus while I was at my desk, if I entered the living room I was drawn into the album, often taking a moment to dance or soak it in on my couch. Furthermore, the small breaks from writing I was awarded in order to flip a record or listen to a particular section of song kept me refreshed while I worked. That undeniable pull from a vinyl record was as strong as ever, even while doing work, which I don’t experience in the same way while streaming. Physical media demands attention even when you try not to give it, its presence in your hands, right in front of your eyes, gives the medium an almost human quality, like it would be rude to ignore it because it shares the space with you.
– Hannah Blanchette
November 26, 2025 | Blog