What do you do when you have a song stuck in your head?

  • Do you listen to more of it? Less?
  • Do you focus on a different song?
  • Do you stop listening to music until it's gone?
49 points · 51 comments · view on lemmy.world

51 Comments

Gullible@lemmy.world · 26 pts · 20d (1 reply)

It’s my brain trying to complete the song. I just listen to it until I’ve memorized it from beginning to to end

pHr34kY@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 19d

I'm sailing awaaaaaaaay...

https://youtu.be/IVSDS2RIOl8?t=35

slazer2au@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 20d (3 replies)

Find a different song to get stuck in my head.

AstroLightz@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d (2 replies)

Wow, you responded really quickly!

I try to do something similar, though the temptation to listen to more of the stuck song is strong too.

slazer2au@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 20d

luck of the draw when browsing by new.

tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 20d

I believe it was Colbert who was talking about this situation and said you need something really distinctive but not long enough to become a new ear worm. He suggested the "by mennen" jingle, which if you're too young or not American enough to know it is literally just 2 seconds of singing the company's name

https://youtu.be/sMuldjND2KA?t=12s

inlandempire@jlai.lu · 8 pts · 20d

sing it, usually

zxqwas@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 20d

Accept that it's there and go about my day. It will fade just as all the others before it.

Melobol@lemmy.ml · 5 pts · 20d (1 reply)

Usually one active listening to it clears the son out. Listen to it while reading the lyrics if you need a stronger ending signal.

SkaraBrae@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 20d

Same for me. It's like closure.

TabbsTheBat@pawb.social · 5 pts · 20d

I listen to it more. Not because it'll get it unstuck or anything. Just cause I like the song

And then if im extra bored and the song has a music video I'll learn the dance choreography and dance in my room in the middle of the night =w=

_lilith@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d

listen to the end of the song or verse, you probably have the middle bit stuck and you just gotta bring it to a conclusion.

TaeKwonDoh@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d

Luckily most of the songs that get stuck in my head are ones I like, so I just let them play until it ends. After that, some other thought(s) occupy my mind, or another song plays.

If it's an annoying one though? Relax and let it pass like a fart in the wind.

lorty@lemmy.ml · 4 pts · 20d

Unless it's some crappy song, just listen to it on repeat until you grow sick of it.

LordFireCrotch@lemmy.today · 4 pts · 19d

In lots of cases, I attempt to learn it on piano. Just a simple version.

PragmaticOne@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d

I have a Megadeath song on standby which I bring to mind and it eliminates the ear worm. 😃

NABDad@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 20d (1 reply)

I hum "America" from West Side Story.

I read somewhere years ago that it kicks out earworms without becoming one, and I found that it works for me.

showmeyourkizinti@startrek.website · 2 pts · 20d

This so weird, I do exactly the same thing except instead of ‘America’ I sing ‘Jet Song’.
“When you’re a jet, you’re a jet all the way…” and all of a sudden the ear worm is gone

TryingToBeGood@reddthat.com · 3 pts · 19d (1 reply)

If it’s an earworm, I will consciously play Thunderstruck in my head until it goes away.

EarWorm@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 19d

Hi! Enjoy Thunderstruck!

IWW4@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 20d

I just let it play out in my head and don’t take any action.

lokalhorst@feddit.org · 2 pts · 20d

I will sing it and will try to spread it to other people

FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 20d

I sing it. Repeatedly.

Ougie@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 19d

My theory is that songs get stuck in your head when you listen to a small part of it so then your brain tries to fill in the rest. So I guess you'd have to listen to the whole thing to make it go away. Haven't really tested this thoroughly enough so if you do, let me know.

solrize@lemmy.ml · 2 pts · 20d (1 reply)

It's a sign that you're not sleeping enough. Catch some Z's.

n3mo@programming.dev · 2 pts · 20d

I find that this is often the case

LastWish@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 20d

If conclude the song in my head. It ends the loop and stops. If I don't know the ending, I make up some grandiose ending so my brain thinks it's over.

quediuspayu@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 20d

I mostly do nothing about it, it eventually goes away. Sometimes however, I feel curious about the song and I listen to the whole song, find out whose song is, if there are more version, look up the lyrics.

It used to bother me but at some point I guess I learned to not care if I get a song stuck. Sometimes it is even fun, I can use it as a conversation starter or stuck it in someone else's head.

SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 20d

I currently have the theme music from Bubsy in Claws Encounters of the Furred Kind stuck in my head but I'm kind of okay with it.

njordomir@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 20d (1 reply)

I listen for a bit, then I listen to some tunes with a similar BPM, style, or key. I think, though I'm not certain, that it's my brain telling me that I need to stimulate it by going new places, hearing new things, doing new stuff, etc. It usually stops when I find something else cool enough to hold my interest.

May I ask, what song you have stuck? I had "Golden" from Kpop Demonhunters such in my head for a few weeks recently but my earworms come from an genres.

AstroLightz@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 20d

I've been binging a lot of anime lately, so a lot of anime opening & ending songs are getting stuck.

Currently I have "Innocence" by NoisyCell stuck in my head (ending song to Barakamon).

Zarobi@aussie.zone · 1 pts · 20d

It's my theme song for the day, and I whistle or hum or tap along or just enjoy it at random moments. Eventually it's replaced with a different song, and I repeat. I find that the song that's playing tends to match up to the theme of the day. Like recently it was "Walking on Sunshine" and it was a day where it finally stopped raining and everyone was just happy and relaxed

tombcat@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 20d

If I remember the song's name, I will listen to it. If I don't remember, I will sing it until I remember the name 🫐

normalentrance@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 19d

Tell my wife about it, she gets annoyed that I put a song in her head. I go about my day and eventually i get into something else with my ADHD brain.

ladybugs@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 19d

Listen to another catchy song and hope it will replace the one that's currently stuck in my head.

Unfortunately, this only occasionally works.

tankfox@bookwyr.me · 1 pts · 20d

Sometimes if it's really bad and I'm on day 3 of a song and it has gotten annoying I'll have to intentionally corrupt the hook that keeps retriggering in my head. It's usually one or two notes that keep springing in and then the rest of the song triggers and starts flowing. When I catch the trigger in my head I grab it and intentionally start imagining that little hooky snip, not the whole song but just two or three annoying notes of it, and loop them until there's another association leading me out of the trigger other than simply leaping back into the song again.

I say to music brain this is you this is what you sound like, and music brain gets grumpy so I finally get some peace.

Klear@piefed.world · 1 pts · 20d

I like mapping for the rhythm shooter Pistol Whip. While working on a map, I have that song stuck in my head the whole time, but as soon as I publish it it's gone.

I've found that it works on songs that get stuck there by other means, so if I want to get rid of one, I make a map with it.

deafboy@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 20d

I try not to sing along in public as it plays in my head, because it's usually some obscene or violent death metal, or deliberately edgy rude cover of a popular song.

DagwoodIII@piefed.social · 1 pts · 20d

[off topic]

'The Demolished Man' by Alfred Bester.

In a future with psychic police officers, a billionaire is planning a murder.

To protect himself from 'peepers' he goes to one of his advertising agencies and tricks a writer into playing him the worst earworm known to science.

When he's around the telepath he just remembers the jingle, over and over.

shadshack@feddit.online · 1 pts · 20d

I get earworms chronically. They're so bad sometimes that I have a song stuck in my head even persisting through a full night's sleep. I started seeing a psychiatrist and got on a Sertraline prescription and it's helped a lot. For me the earworms are likely a symptom of a mild OCD condition. They also correlate with headaches, so if they're pretty bad I'll take some acetaminophen or ibuprofen to help a little more.

hexagonwin@lemmy.today · 1 pts · 20d

i find other songs from that album/artist and see if they're good

finallymadeanaccount@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 20d (2 replies)

Punch myself in the testicles. You'd be surprised how much this can distract you from an earworm.

tankfox@bookwyr.me · 3 pts · 20d (1 reply)

Do you do it to the beat of the song?

finallymadeanaccount@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 20d

Only the once

Agent641@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 20d

ill never get tired of Easy Street so it's fine!

xob232@piefed.zip · 1 pts · 18d

I share it on social media in hopes of passing the ear worm to someone else.

ooooh… think I just created a new hit horror movie franchise. Ear worm 🪱

eta@feddit.org · 1 pts · 20d

Nothing really. Sometimes I then listen to it when I have time. Recently however I actually started practicing guitar because I thought "can't be that hard to play" and a roommate had a guitar I could use. So far I'm still at it and eypanded into some more songs.

aloofPenguin@piefed.world · 1 pts · 20d

for the short term/ when I don't have a device that can play music: focus on a different song. Otherwise I would listen to more of it rarely mixed in with others E: or if I don't know the name, just keep on repeating it until it goes away.

Vanth@reddthat.com · 1 pts · 20d

I hum it off and on for literally years. Pretty sure I have hummed a bar of "my milkshake brings the boys to the yard" in public dozens if not hundreds of times.

I don't know any lyrics beyond that hook and I couldn't even tell you the artist/group. If I stopped to think why that song, it might bother me. So I don't think about it.

Feathercrown@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 18d

Sing it

VonVoelksen@discuss.tchncs.de · 0 pts · 20d