• Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Private Member only forums for more serious discussions that you may wish to not have guests or search engines access to.
    • Your very own blog. Write about anything you like on your own individual blog.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral

Do you ALWAYS have a song playing in your mind, 24/7?

Paige Turner

New Member
Is it always the same song?

Every single day of my life, I've heard music playing. Mostly popular songs, but sometimes just something I made up. I'll hear the same one from months, then suddenly it will be something else. The song reflects my moood. It stops I'm listening to other music or TV show, but when that's over, the music starts again. I'm wondering if maybe it's an autistic thing.

Maybe that's my soul, and it thinks in music.
 
Yes, often. It can last a few hours or several days. If it is a song I like it isn't so bad. When I was young I kind of liked it. But if it is a song I don't like, planted there by accident, such as I heard it on the radio, it can be hellish.

A related phenomena that became noticable later in life was ambient noise (such as from an air conditioner) would suggest and then perpetuate music in my head. It was kind of fun at first but became inceasingly annoying as I couldn't stop it if I wanted. Worse, it could start up even without ambient noise. The negative aspects seemed to develop after prolonged exposure to such noises, and loud ones, in my work career. A it's peak it could be many hours a day of this driving drum beat in my head, every day. No longer exposed to such things, it has slowly faded thankfully. Nothing worse then not being in control of the radio.

;)
 
Last edited:
Yes, this can happen for me. Like if it's raining out when I walk out to the car or walk into the store I might instinctively sing in my head, "Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head" and then even the next day or for several days I can do the same even if it's not raining. Or if I am on the rare occasion really happy and feel energetic, I could sing repeatedly to myself "Top of the World" or if I saw the moon out at night near a body of water, as water is all around where I live, I could want to sing "Moon River" as I am into dreaming of peaceful and better times. Anything can trigger me to sing a new song in my head thus.

Like recently, my eleven year old Autistic son was singing and playing keyboard to "My Way" for the last several days, as the last six months his voice has been deeper to want to change up his music style a bit, and now I cannot get that song out of my mind, as its his next song he wants to master and show others. Also, there have been times a song from the 80's came on the radio, and it brought back good memories, so I can sing that for days then to bring me back to my mood at those times. In my case, the songs I keep thinking about are usually ones I like though, or involving some better mood.

Overall, I need music to help relax and motivate me, as I need something calming, inspiring or positive to sing to myself because of OCD tendencies where my mind needs to be active on repeat cycle.
 
Last edited:
Is it always the same song?

Every single day of my life, I've heard music playing. Mostly popular songs, but sometimes just something I made up. I'll hear the same one from months, then suddenly it will be something else. The song reflects my moood. It stops I'm listening to other music or TV show, but when that's over, the music starts again. I'm wondering if maybe it's an autistic thing.

Maybe that's my soul, and it thinks in music.
I think you can update the playlist with practice. When I do my affirmations like I am supposed to (repeat 77 times) the saying burbles back up into my mind about 30hours later
 
Yes. I'm very sensitive to this because I'm so prone to getting parts of songs "looping" in my head. I have to be careful because of that. For example, I don't listen to music hours before bed and my wife doesn't play or even mention songs to me in the evening for that reason.

For example, I've had a part of the Zeppelin song When the Levee Breaks in my head literally for days now.
 
I wonder if it's an autism thing, like being able to hear the individual notes of a chord. Supposedly, that's rare in non-auties. God knows why. Someone plays 3 notes and you can hear them. So what? Big deal.
Probably another genetic defect, like being Real Smart.
 
More often than not, when someone says a phrase that reminds me of lyrics, it will trigger a song in my mind...
 
Yes, that's normal for me. Maybe not literally 24/7, though I do often hear music in my dreams, too :)
 
Last edited:
Nearly every time when I wake up, whether it's time to get up or not. :oops:

Some tunes just stick with me, until the next one becomes my latest fixation. :rolleyes:
 
Nope. Not usually. I have a musical stim though, just the one bar from the beach boys song "wouldnt it be nice" which I will hum over and over and OVER - drives my wife absolutely bonkers *lol*
Only when I'm in a happy place working on something. So luckily not around customers. Ha ha.
 
Not always, but sometimes it gets a bit silly. Was paddling on a local river for 4 hours today and had two tunes become my earworms for today.
The first - the big dongo family

The second - do something different

The first, terminally cute, the second a subversive Chicago style polka.
 
At times a tune will stick in my head and repeat but not 24/7.

I will say that every time I get into an elevator I automatically start humming a certain Aerosmith song. The song pops up every time.
 
Soon as I wake up some song starts. Nothing triggers it nor is it any certain song.
And isn't the same one stuck in a loop for long periods of time.
They change very rapidly most of the time.
It can be any era also. I don't control it. It's just always been normal for me.
The only time there isn't a song in my head is when I'm engaged in something else like TV, radio in car,
or doing something that requires a lot of concentration.
I don't hear it when asleep, or maybe I do...
as I need ambient music to go to sleep easily and anytime I am at home doing things around the house.

I've asked a few people about this and only found one who said he had a radio 24/7.
He was a guitarist in a band.

There was a post similar to this a long time ago and a lot of people on here said the music/songs
were always like a background sound in their head. Maybe it is something to do with ASD.:cool:
 
Yes, constantly have some song or another floating around in my head. Not often but sometimes the same part of the song keeps looping and will never get to the chorus or the verse (depending where it's stuck).

Sometimes I'll listen to the song playing in my head carefully to see if I can pick out nuanced, subtle features and listen to the real song to see if it's really there. (sometimes it is, didn't notice listening in real life but noticed during playback in my head lol).
 
Yes. Most of the time, I have some kind of music playing in my head. At the moment, it’s a really good one by Myrkur - Ulvinde, I think.

This is one of the reasons I hate piped music on public places, or having to listen to music I don’t enjoy or which is too repetitive. Sometimes I can end up in a loop where I can’t stop thinking around and around the song - songs with choruses can be particularly frustrating, if they don’t vary them from verse to verse. If I get a song I don’t like stuck in my head, it can be torture.

This is also the reason why I hate Christmas music.
 
Not trying to revive an old thread but I got excited when I found this.

There’s some sort of song in my head 24/7. I can actually hear it as if the radio is playing at a low volume. Not loud enough to effect my ability to hear other ‘real’ sounds. The only time it’s gone is when something external is loud enough to block it out. I have no control over which song it is. Too often its one that I really only know a few lyrics, so I’ll get a broken record player stuck on a song I don’t even like playing the same 5 words over and over for an eternity. Occasionally the same song will stick there for weeks. It’s like having a crying baby inside my head day and night. Even if I wake up to go to the bathroom, same 5 words start up the moment I open my eyes.

Long before I heard of Autism I got into car stereo systems. Giant subwoofers and amplifiers that make your teeth rattle. Driving with music blasting became my sanctuary. 30 years later….. I recognize that it’s the only way I can get the noise out of my mind, including the broken record. It’s like turning up the television so that I can’t hear the neighbor’s barking chihuahua. I’m getting too old to be building boom boxes and spending hours rewiring a whole car, so now I get scared sometimes about what will happen if my crappy old car(with an awesome sound system) finally dies forever.

I spent the first half of my life thinking it was ‘normal’ Now I understand that it’s because I have Asperger’s.
 
Yes, not a day goes by that i dont have some song or another in my head and if i dont know the words i will make up my own to the tune , sadly the worst part is im tone deaf and still will hum or sing it until either a new one pops in or i listen to it on a loop til it gets out of my system.
And it varies wildly from oldies to classical to pop to heavy metal. . . Whatever my brain seems to think i want even if i dont lol.
 
Yes, not a day goes by that i dont have some song or another in my head and if i dont know the words i will make up my own to the tune , sadly the worst part is im tone deaf and still will hum or sing it until either a new one pops in or i listen to it on a loop til it gets out of my system.
And it varies wildly from oldies to classical to pop to heavy metal. . . Whatever my brain seems to think i want even if i dont lol.
It’s pretty common for me to make up a completely new tune, create lyrics that don’t make sense, and then it’s stuck for hours or days.
 

New Threads

Top Bottom