Making A Playlist For A Tough Workout

[Duncan Glenday]

I regularly go to indoor training courses for cycle racing. (Long story - it's on a thing called a CompuTrainer, and a certified racing instructor puts 8 of us at a time through some VERY tough workouts. Picture below.)

Point is - I've been asked to create a playlist of music to be played at a few of these sessions.

So I'm looking for something that is:
** Approachable for non-prog people (Muggles)
** Fairly heavy, to match the very tough workouts - and at least equivalent to the hard rock they usually play.
** Still prog / prog-metal / whatever - i.e. more intellectual than the drecht they usually play

Any thoughts?

KASS.jpg

Here's a picture of last Saturday's training course:
8 of us in a semi-circle, watching a screen that shows everyone's stats - so you're actually racing everyone else in the class.
(Check out the good looking hunk in black and white, at the far left )

[yesman1955]

Check out Brian Eno's Nerve Net from 1992 - more driving rock stuff than ambient - have used it for Stairmaster sessions

[JKL2000]

[Gravedigger]

How about some of Deep Purple's more uptempo stuff like "Burn", "Highway Star", or "Gypsy's Kiss"?
Or does that fall under the hard rock that they usually play?

[battema]

Duncan....when working out these days I use Chimp Spanner fairly often. It is driving and mostly uptempo.

Check out Maserati's last album too...not as metal but fairly great uptempo stuff. Sort of like Ozric Tentacles but less, ummm, aimless perhaps?

Zombi works pretty well too.

[Facelift]

Deliberately sequenced.

Losing My Edge - LCD Soundsystem (st)
Aerodynamic - Daft Punk (Discovery)
The Great Curve - Talking Heads
Help Me Somebody - Brian Eno/David Byrne (My Life in Bush of Ghosts)
Atlas - Battles (Mirrored)
Waiting Room - Fugazi (st)
Hot Rails to Hell - Blue Oyster Cult (Tyranny & Mutation)
400 Bucks - Reverend Horton Heat (Full Custom Gospel Sounds Of)
Ditch (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion)
Jesus Built By Hotrod - Ministry (Psalm 69)
DMV - Primus (Pork Soda)
Five-G - Bruford (One of a Kind)
La Mela di Odessa - Area (Crac)
Vital Transformation - Mahavishnu Orchestra (Inner Mounting Flame)

[Jerjo]

One of my fave stoner albums to listen to on the treadmill would be Wo Fat's Black Code

[Boceephus]

My high tempo workout mix:
Spoonman (Soundgarden)
Over My Head (King's
Train of Consequences (Megadeth)
Bodies (Drowning Pool)
Stupify (Disturbed)
I Can't Take You w Me (D97)
So Ready (echolyn)

[Supersonic Scientist]

I tend to favorite:

Up-tempo Ozrics
LIVE Deep Purple
Iron Maiden
Al Di Meola's up-tempo electric stuff.
Symphony X
Some Mahavishnu Orchestra

[gryphs also]

I've discovered that listening to good music does not make working out more enjoyable; working out makes good songs less enjoyable.

[Scrotum Scissor]

** Approachable for non-prog people (Muggles)
** Fairly heavy, to match the very tough workouts - and at least equivalent to the hard rock they usually play.
** Still prog / prog-metal / whatever - i.e. more intellectual than the drecht they usually play

Any thoughts?

I can obviously only relate to my own experience (being a runner and lifter), but the following are three artists that I keep spinning while working out intensively:

[rottersclub]

I go with techno/rock/groove oriented stuff:

Ozrics
Hydria Spacefolk
Quantum Fantay
Taipuva Luotisuora
Korai Öröm
Másfél
Kraan

[JAMOOL]

Deliberately sequenced.

Losing My Edge - LCD Soundsystem (st)
Aerodynamic - Daft Punk (Discovery)
The Great Curve - Talking Heads
Help Me Somebody - Brian Eno/David Byrne (My Life in Bush of Ghosts)
Atlas - Battles (Mirrored)
Waiting Room - Fugazi (st)
Hot Rails to Hell - Blue Oyster Cult (Tyranny & Mutation)
400 Bucks - Reverend Horton Heat (Full Custom Gospel Sounds Of)
Ditch (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion)
Jesus Built By Hotrod - Ministry (Psalm 69)
DMV - Primus (Pork Soda)
Five-G - Bruford (One of a Kind)
La Mela di Odessa - Area (Crac)
Vital Transformation - Mahavishnu Orchestra (Inner Mounting Flame)

Good list - but I would imagine something like "Atlas" would freak people out!

Ultimately finding good workout music can be tough - if you're working out hard at all it is tough to concentrate on the music, so anything too complex just sort of washes over the ears. I prefer shorter, catchier songs. A 10-minute prog epic feels like about 30 minutes when you're doing cardio

[rottersclub]

If Battles is the band that has "Munchkin" vox, then yes, I think some people might ride off a cliff.

[Facelift]

Good list - but I would imagine something like "Atlas" would freak people out!

Ultimately finding good workout music can be tough - if you're working out hard at all it is tough to concentrate on the music, so anything too complex just sort of washes over the ears. I prefer shorter, catchier songs. A 10-minute prog epic feels like about 30 minutes when you're doing cardio

I do regular stationary cycling myself so I can say with prior experience that Atlas is a *great* cycling song. Music to perform cycling to needs to have intensity and/or a strong beat to be an effective accompanying force and Atlas has both, IMO.

I guess it could be a little intimidating for someone unused to it, but I'd bet they would learn to at least appreciate its utility as a cycling aid.

[JAMOOL]

It definitely does - I use it for the same purpose. But there's just something about that tune that makes people uncomfortable.

[Duncan Glenday]

Thanks for the recommendations so far.

Although I have a CD collection of almost 4,000, there's a LOT in the posts above that I don't have.

I'm listening to Battles / Mirrored / Atlas on Grooveshark.com right now. Sounds quite cool!

I'll spend some time this weekend building a playlist from the above and from my own thoughts, and will try it out in the gym before I take it to my CompuTrainer class.

Thanks again - and I look forward to more recommendations.

[ProgPariah77]

+ 1 for Chimp Spanner.

[Lou]

The first half of the Adrenaline Mob debut cd is a gym staple for me. The Frameshift cd "Absence of Empathy" has a lot of choice stuff too.
Pain of Salvation is a gold mine as well. "In the Flesh" gets regular rotation, along with much of the rest of TPE, and Remedy Lane.

[progfan915]

I have quite a lot of Rush on my workout playlist. It's perfect! You can find great songs from any decade that will get the heart pumping

[Shadow]

JAZZ/FUSION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[llanwydd]

I started lifting when I was 18 and continued for about two years. It was absolutely always Jethro Tull. Yes was and still is my favorite but somehow Tull made it easier to lift and got my blood circulating. If I was lifting with my friend John it was Tull and Neil Young's Live Rust which I found tolerable but I have never liked Young's voice.

[cavgator]

Joe Satriani. He dominates my workout playlist.

[Facelift]

I started lifting when I was 18 and continued for about two years. It was absolutely always Jethro Tull. Yes was and still is my favorite but somehow Tull made it easier to lift and got my blood circulating. If I was lifting with my friend John it was Tull and Neil Young's Live Rust which I found tolerable but I have never liked Young's voice.

One has not bench-pressed until they've done so to "Jack-In-The-Green."

[llanwydd]

One has not bench-pressed until they've done so to "Jack-In-The-Green."

I believe SFtW was one of the albums I was listening to the day I learned the hard way never to bench without a spotter. Unfortunately John didn't always want to listen to Tull.