# Do you get earworms?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [June 2, 2015, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430 "2015-06-02T09:12:35Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Apollon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollon)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/1 "2015-06-02T09:12:35Z")
Not the insects, but the music that plays in your head.
I have them all the time. It’s so bad that most nights I go to bed having one, and it’s still playing when I wake up in the morning. Not starting to play, mind you, but already sounding in the background as my consciousness is pulling itself together. I can have the same piece for up to 4 days in a row. The first day it’s actually kinda pleasant, but after the third day it just poisons everything.
It’s never an entire song, but just a segment of either 8 or 16 bars (always a complete period or two, but usually ending in a half cadence). The music is always primarily melodic, but it must have a harmonic progression. Purely melodic, or purely harmonic music doesn’t lend itself to earwormification. But it can’t be atonal. The genre is all over the place - from 90s techno to classical symphonies, from cartoon themes to baroque fugues.
I can force it to proceed beyond the point where it usually breaks off if left alone, but that takes willpower, and the earworm will revert to its old pattern as soon as I get distracted. Even playing the entire piece from beginning to end on the piano doesn’t help (I’ve been trying that for decades - it has never succeeded in silencing the earworm).
That being said, I was talking to someone the other day, who claims to absolutely never experience earworms. That baffled me, and now I’m wondering how common that is.
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### Author:  [@Uniqueorn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uniqueorn)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 10:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/2 "2015-06-02T10:48:53Z")
It’s interesting that you try playing the song on the piano. My method of getting rid of earworms is passively listening to the version that’s playing in my head in its entirety. Someone once told me that the brain is repeating earworms because it’s looking for the ending. Which makes sense to me and screws those people who have Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony in their head.
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### Author:  [@Chauve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chauve)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 11:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/3 "2015-06-02T11:00:29Z")
I used to get them once in a while. I got rid of them by thinking up a better tune and humming it loudly until the first tune went away.
Now I never get them. I think it’s because I pretty much always have music playing in the background. It’s hard to have a tune playing in my head when a another tune that I like is playing on the radio.
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### Author:  [@Your\_Great\_Darsh\_Face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Your_Great_Darsh_Face)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/4 "2015-06-02T11:04:30Z")
> [@Uniqueorn](#):
>
> It’s interesting that you try playing the song on the piano. My method of getting rid of earworms is passively listening to the version that’s playing in my head in its entirety. Someone once told me that the brain is repeating earworms because it’s looking for the ending. Which makes sense to me and screws those people who have Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony in their head.
The _Unfinished_ has an end, but the faux-Scottish tune _Highland Cathedral_ can repeat A-B-A-B-A… almost indefinitely, as I have been finding over the last few days, and neither playing it on the piano nor listening to Youtube recordings really deals with the issue.
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### Author:  [@AllShookDown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AllShookDown)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/5 "2015-06-02T11:15:38Z")
I don’t have one every day or even every week but sometimes I’ll get one that lasts for several days. Most recently, Van Morrison’s “Glad Tidings.” I hope writing that doesn’t make it start up again.
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### Author:  [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/6 "2015-06-02T12:23:32Z")
I have them very often, but they’re usually from an earworm repertoire of maybe 20-30 pieces of music (of all kinds). I can barely think of one without the earworm self-starting. And like the OP, I often awake with one already in my head from the previous night. It may take a while before I even realize it’s still there.
I find that listening to other music usually does not break the earworm.
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### Author:  [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/7 "2015-06-02T12:48:15Z")
I didn’t take the poll because while I always have some song fragment in my head, it doesn’t bother me and I don’t need it to stop.
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### Author:  [@Apollon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollon)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/8 "2015-06-02T12:48:41Z")
> [@Uniqueorn](#):
>
> It’s interesting that you try playing the song on the piano. My method of getting rid of earworms is passively listening to the version that’s playing in my head in its entirety. Someone once told me that the brain is repeating earworms because it’s looking for the ending. Which makes sense to me and screws those people who have Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony in their head.
I don’t do that any more, because it just doesn’t work. It only reinforces it.
Yeah, I’ve heard about that theory, and my guess is that it was made up by someone who never experiences earworms. 😛
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### Author:  [@Apollon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollon)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/9 "2015-06-02T12:55:14Z")
> [@panache45](#):
>
> I find that listening to other music usually does not break the earworm.
The very second the other music stops, the dreaded earworm comes back! I know that too!
One thing I neglected to mention: Very, very often, it’s some music that I positively loathe. Like Blurred Lines, the intro from Sailor Moon, or that one horrible French military march that was playing in my head while I was having sex. :smack:
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### Author:  [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/10 "2015-06-02T13:08:35Z")
Yes. I always make a point of sharing them on social media, so my friends there can have the same joy.
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### Author:  [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/11 "2015-06-02T13:22:18Z")
I have learned a trick that works for me - singing another earworm. Yes it seems counterintuitive but I have sort of trained my brain after many years. When I sing X song it knows to get rid of the earworm.
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### Author:  [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/12 "2015-06-02T13:48:33Z")
There is really no spot for me in the poll. It’s not every day, but it’s fairly often, and they can last for hours on end.
Just this morning a friend was complaining about how “They make it harder than it has to be. Really, unnecessarily so.” [Cue Porgy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBOgH5f36cQ) I’m sure he’ll be with me all day.
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### Author:  [@Rebo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rebo)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/13 "2015-06-02T14:14:01Z")
Constantly, unless the TV or music is on. I will turn off hated songs immediately so they won’t become earworms. Doesn’t always work, though. It’s always music I listen to, which is classic rock and country. Sometimes commercials! “Eight hundred five eight eight, two three hundred, EMPIRE!”
Arggh! Make it stop!
The worst is when I don’t know the lyrics completely, and it’s a tiny snippet constantly looping in my brain.
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### Author:  [@swampspruce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/swampspruce)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/14 "2015-06-02T14:21:08Z")
I read somewhere that humming La Marseillaise(probably MPSIMS, or here somewhere) can get rid of a lot of earworms because of the change in tempo and the relative complexity of the tune.
On a side note, I once had the name “Alec Issigonis” stuck in my head on repeat for about 9 days after watching a documentary on the Mini. At least it wasn’t
Surfin’ Bird…Babababababababa birdbirdbird…
Your welcome.
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### Author:  [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/15 "2015-06-02T14:31:39Z")
I get them. And I cause them.
The way I pick a new passwork is by taking a line from a song, and using the first letter of each word to generate a password. Easy to remember. Sometimes too easy and my password song will play in my head for a while.
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### Author:  [@G0sp3l](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/G0sp3l)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/16 "2015-06-02T14:59:08Z")
I used to get them but my wife rolled up some sort of pills in a cold-cut and made me eat it.
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### Author:  [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/17 "2015-06-02T15:24:19Z")
I went third choice. I’m about once every 3-4 weeks but when I do get one it lasts for several hours.
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/18 "2015-06-02T15:44:24Z")
I get 'em all the time, but they tend to come and go. Something triggers the memory of a song, and it’ll start going through my head. But since practically everything reminds me of a song, a new one is always popping into my head. So I rarely have a single song going through my head all day, let alone multiple days. And usually (not always, but mostly) they’re songs I like.
Right now, I’ve got Dylan’s “You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go” running through my head, because a new Doper, **Queen Anne’s Lace** , posted to the Death Pool thread, recalling:
\*
Purple clover, Queen Anne’s Lace
Crimson hair across your face
You could make me cry if you don’t know
Can’t remember what I was thinkin’ of
You might be spoilin’ me too much, love
You’re gonna make me lonesome when you go\*
No complaints about that one - I could hear it in my head forever, and never realize the time.
I do have recurring earworms, usually due to a recurring trigger. Lately my wife’s become the ‘box top lady’ (as in ‘box tops for education’ that you see on a lot of household products) for the Firebug’s elementary school. So when she’s working on those, I get songs by the Box Tops, the 1960s pop group, going through my head: “The Letter,” “Cry Like A Baby,” “Soul Deep,” etc.
Again, no complaints: I _like_ those songs.
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### Author:  [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/19 "2015-06-02T16:06:07Z")
> [@Apollon](#):
>
> Not the insects, but the music that plays in your head.
>
> I have them all the time. It’s so bad that most nights I go to bed having one, and it’s still playing when I wake up in the morning. Not starting to play, mind you, but already sounding in the background as my consciousness is pulling itself together. I can have the same piece for up to 4 days in a row. The first day it’s actually kinda pleasant, but after the third day it just poisons everything.
>
> It’s never an entire song, but just a segment of either 8 or 16 bars (always a complete period or two, but usually ending in a half cadence). The music is always primarily melodic, but it must have a harmonic progression. Purely melodic, or purely harmonic music doesn’t lend itself to earwormification. But it can’t be atonal. The genre is all over the place - from 90s techno to classical symphonies, from cartoon themes to baroque fugues.
>
> I can force it to proceed beyond the point where it usually breaks off if left alone, but that takes willpower, and the earworm will revert to its old pattern as soon as I get distracted. Even playing the entire piece from beginning to end on the piano doesn’t help (I’ve been trying that for decades - it has never succeeded in silencing the earworm).
>
> That being said, I was talking to someone the other day, who claims to absolutely never experience earworms. That baffled me, and now I’m wondering how common that is.
My experience is similar, but without the exception for atonal music, purely melodic or purely harmonic music. I cannot remember a time when I was not hearing music in my head, ever. It is always there, always going. Sometimes it’s a few bars of a song, sometimes it’s a whole song, and occasionally it’s just “music”. On rare occasions I’ll have parts to two or more songs going at once, like my auditory cortex is having a mash-up party. The, ah, selection process is 99.9999% involuntary, although sometimes a song I like and have been listening to will insert itself; usually it seems to be completely random. It never stops, not ever.
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### Author:  [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2015, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-get-earworms/721430/20 "2015-06-02T16:42:27Z")
Did the term ‘ear worm’ come from Chekov in Star Trek II? Or does it predate that?
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