I listened to music constantly while I worked, for decades. I loved music, deeply, so its presence made me happy, and having some intentional sound filling up the air made it easier to tune out the real world and focus on the world inside the machine.

I listened to many kinds of music over the years, though rarely pop music; getting my language-processing faculties too deeply involved drags my attention away from the work.

Goa trance and psychedelic downtempo were the best I ever found. Alas that those eras are over.

I used to find actual silence unbearable, due to the tinnitus I've had virtually all my life, but in recent years the ringing has been just kind of there, not painful; it no longer distracts me.

Heartbreak, and the collapse of a musical community in which I was a DJ, took the joy out of music a few years ago. I don't listen to anything while I work anymore, and rather to my surprise this has been working out fine.