Song of Inspiration: Character ideas based off of music

[Manly Man]

As the title says, post either a song you've used to base a character off of, or talk about the character itself.

I'll start it off with a Kensai archetype Magus I made based on this song here. It was in a module that I didn't really appreciate all that well, what with the fact that you never felt like you even accomplished anything, just that you survived.

The DM was a bit of an ass too, so there was that, but that's beside the point. It was a fun idea, at least. What are your own experiences with song-based characters?

[Slipperychicken]

I recall that one of my GMs based a campaign off the song American Pie. This surprised me, since I couldn't find a reference anywhere. It was a pretty bad campaign too..

One of the bosses in that campaign was addicted to some super-drug. It threw everyone for a loop when I reminded them that the Remove Addiction spell existed.

[DarkKensai]

Hmm...

It's not a song so much as an artist, but I'm DMing a campaign where I'm going to have a one-off NPC Bard named Fraedric Quicksilver.

[prufock]

I was planning a character based around not just one song, but a bunch of songs by AC/DC. It was for a "minions" campaign my DM was planning. We'd play the usually-nameless henchmen of a James Bond-esque evil mastermind. My guy was an explosives and demolition expert. Hard of hearing, with aspects of post-concussive syndrome, he's also a bit nuts. Think Danny McBride's character in Tropic Thunder, but darker. Played as an explosives "genius" but often messes up some little details due to poor memory and attention (from the PCS). But he's also very lucky, and things work out in his favour despite his flaws.

Of course, in-character he is also a big AC/DC fan, and I was planning to bring my iPod loaded with AC/DC songs to play during his scenes.

Thunderstruck, You Shook Me All Night Long, Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap, High Voltage, TNT, Shoot to Thrill, Big Gun, Live Wire, Guns for Hire, Hard as a Rock, If You Want Blood You've Got It, War Machine, etc.

Also, one theme of a supers campaign I'm running right now is the number 11, so I've played themes in 11/4 time, and songs mentioning the number 11 at each session.

[Krazzman]

I tried it... a few times.

I am still thinking about a way to get a character to wield or reflect Dark Tranquility's "White Noise/Black Silence"... although this is not that high a priority in my mind.

In my campaign I was thinking (campaign is on hiatus) about implementing some bosses that were sort of done to reflect the meaning/theme/whatever still unsure about it of Infected Mushrooms "Becoming Insane" "Smashing the Opponent" "Pink Nightmares" and so on.

3 Inches of Blood's Destroy the Orcs spawned a character idea too.

[TheStranger]

I've always wanted to do a campaign based on The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday. Or just generally use Gamehendge as a setting.

[mucat]

In this case, the characters were not originally based on the songs -- because we first heard the music after the campaign was well underway -- but The Clockwork Quartet write uncannily good theme songs for the characters in our Steampunk campaign.

A fellow giantitp forum poster first gave me a link to their music, and pointed out how well The Doctor's Wife, an excellent and horrifying song by any standard, sums up my obsessive mad surgeon PC.

Another player realized that Closer could have been written for her character, a younger scientist on an entirely different trajectory toward madness. ("I hate to say it, but I think both our characters are quite doomed.")

Which led to another terrifying thought. Clockwork Quartet have only published three songs. If two of them capture characters in that campaign so perfectly...then somewhere in the campaign world, the Watchmaker's Apprentice must be walking around.

And our GM grins evilly...