Do you use song lyrics as inspiration for adventures?

[TheLostSoul]

Music often inspires me. Here is a few examples:

Katatonia: Viva Emptiness - I am planning a small Demon campaign based on this album. Mainly due to the illustration of a person lying in a container. Some rubble in the background makes it look like he has wings. Like a fallen, dead angel. It was taken by Travis Smith (www.siempieces.com). Generally I have been very inspired by their music. Mainly for ghoststories and other gothic tales.

My Dying Bride: The Light at the End of the World - The title track on this album has inspired me to create a small demi-plane, that is the last remnants of a material plane. The plane consists of a ocean and a small island with a lighthouse. The lighthouse keeper tends the lighthouse as a payment to a god who granted him a last night with his beloved. Now he keeps the lighthouse alone, only accompanied by the seagulls and rodents that populate the small island. I love that track!

My Dying Bride: Catherine Blake - A great track, which could be the basis for a great apocalyptic game.

Cradle of Filth: Her Ghost in the Fog - This track could be the basis of a great Gothic ghoststory. A woman, accused of witchcraft, is raped by three priests. She then tells her boyfriend to kill her. That he does and he then proceeds to burn down the church the priests are in.

Ulver: Perdition City - This album has inspired be to write a film-noir chronicle for the new World of Darkness. The album has a great film-noir mood and is perfect for more dark modern investigatory campaigns. Their album "Themes from William Blake's - The Marriage of Heaven and Hell" is also a great inspirational album.

Mortiis: Crypt of the Wizard and The Stargate - These two albums are great for traditional D&D campaigns. Very atmospheric and mostly instrumental. The stargate also features a storyline that could create a great D&D campaign.

Draconian: Arcane Rain Fell - This new album is a good inspirational source for gothic scenarios. Especially if set in a dark fantasy world like Ravenloft.

Other sources I find are great for inspiration: Blackmore's Night (great renaissance inspired music. Great for taverns), :Of the Wand and the Moon: (dark, atmospheric neofolk. Great for travels in woods and for dark fantasy), Forseti (in the vein of :Of the Wand and the Moon, Blut aus Nord (Their latest EP (Thematic Emanation of Archetypical Multiplicity) is great for dark, industrial settings), The Amenta (good inpiration for dark, industrial sci-fi settings) and Borknagar, Moonsorrow and Finntroll (Great viking metal and very good for norse campaigns).

 

[Talmun]

Headphones are your friend. Unless you work the phones, then hopefully the music you get stuck in your head is the good stuff.[/size]

Yeah, I work an ISP help-desk, so no headphones

I forgot that I once threw into a game, on a whim, a carnivorous plant inspired by 'Hellflower' by the Electric Hellfire Club. Total off the cuff encounter that actually went quite well.

There aren't any lyrics, but the last movement of Dvorac's 9th is very inspiring. Actually, the whole thing is pretty darn cool.

What, no Gwar yet?

 

[Starman]

I've always wanted to do a whole campaign based around Queen's music. Seven Seas of Rhye, especially, always struck me as having a lot of potential.

Seven Seas Of Rhye
Written by Freddie Mercury

Fear me you lords and lady preachers
I descend upon your Earth from the skies
I command your very souls you unbelievers
Bring before me what is mine
The seven seas of Rhye

Can you hear me you peers and privy counsellors
I stand before you naked to the eyes
I will destroy any man who dares abuse my trust
I swear that you'll be mine
The seven seas of Rhye

Sister - I live and lie for you
Mister - do and I'll die
You are mine I possess you
I belong to you forever-ever-ever-aah

Storm the master-marathon I'll fly through
By flash and thunder-fire and
I'll survive - I'll survive - I'll survive
I'll survive - I'll survive - I'll survive
Then I'll defy the laws of nature and come out alive
Then I'll get you
Be gone with you - you shod and shady senators
Give out the good, leave out the bad evil cries
I challenge the mighty Titan and his troubadours
And with a smile
I'll take you to the seven seas of Rhye
- oh I do like to be beside the seaside
- oh I do like to be beside the sea
- where the brass band plays - tiddly om pom pom
- oh I do like to be beside the seaside
- oh I do like to be beside the sea

Starman

 

[Angel Tarragon]

What, no Gwar yet?

Gwar huh, what is it good for?

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

I have based an upcoming story arc in my campaign on Number of the Beast by Iron Maiden

Which is itself based on Young Goodman Brown, yes?

I'd love to hear some other non-metal choices.

Non...metal...choices? I am intrigued. Tell me more of these...non-metal choices.

I want to run an adventure based on Nightwish's 10th Man Down. It seems to be about a soldier who goes crazy, kills his squad mates, and is hunted down and hung. Would be great in IK.

 

[DarkSoldier]

I built a Ravenloft domain out of the Eagles's "Hotel California." I used a lot of Blue Öyster Cult references in other Ravenloft material (the Dragon Lady and another domain that uses elements from "Harvest Moon").

I'm thinking about incorporating more BÖC "homage" into the campaign world I'm writing; Workshop of the Telescopes, Veteran of the Psychic Wars, Les Invisibles, and Blue Öyster Cult are looking good at the moment.

 

[Cthulhu's Librarian]

Which is itself based on Young Goodman Brown, yes?

You know what? I don't know. I guess I'm going to have to go read that now... Thanks for the heads up!

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

I might well be wrong, it's been a while since I've read it. But it is just the sort of thing they'd do.

EDIT: Thinking now, about the general theme (stumbling upon a demonic gathering in the woods and being haunted by the memory). It's likely in my mind that they were seperately concieved.

 

[DungeonmasterCal]

I built a Ravenloft domain out of the Eagles's "Hotel California." I used a lot of Blue Öyster Cult references in other Ravenloft material (the Dragon Lady and another domain that uses elements from "Harvest Moon").

I'm thinking about incorporating more BÖC "homage" into the campaign world I'm writing; Workshop of the Telescopes, Veteran of the Psychic Wars, Les Invisibles, and Blue Öyster Cult are looking good at the moment.

"I Love the Night" by BOC would be a good choice, too. It's essentially about a guy who meets a female vampire and really digs the outcome.

 

[yennico]

I used Tom Waits´s: "Little Drop Of Poison" for an assassin adventure.

I like my town with a little drop of poison
Nobody knows they're lining up to go insane
I'm all alone, I smoke my friends down to the filter
But I feel much cleaner after it rains

She left in the fall, that's her picture on the wall
She always had that little drop of poison
She left in the fall, that's her picture on the wall
She always had that little drop of poison

Did the devil make the world while god was sleeping
Someone said you'll never get a wish from a bone
Another wrong good-bye and a hundred sailors
That deep blue sky is my home

She left in the fall, that's her picture on the wall
She always had that little drop of poison
She left in the fall, that's her picture on the wall
She always had that little drop of poison

A rat always knows when he's in with weasels
Here you lose a little every day
I remember when a million was a million
They all have ways to make you pay
They all have ways to make you pay