Music to work by has become a whole genre unto itself. There are the Spotify playlists of “lofi beats study to” and the eponymous Lofi Girl 24-hour livestreams. Other people swear by classical music, others eschew music altogether and opt for ambient nature sounds. But for me, there is only one true answer for what to listen to all day in the office: FIP.
FIP, or France Inter Paris, is a radio network of the French national public broadcaster. It’s hard to describe FIP to the uninitiated, as its free-ranging and eclectic style can mix classic music with German hip-hop, indie rock, and mid-century jazz, creating a feeling akin to an iPod placed on shuffle. But once you start to listen, you realize the intention behind each choice, subtle connective tissue linking each song to the others. There are few rules when it comes to FIP, except that each track must have some form of connection to the previous one and that no song can be played more than once every 48 hours. The result is an uninterrupted stream of curated music that always keeps you guessing.
I first heard FIP when traveling in Europe. I’d be standing in the indie magazine store in Berlin struck by the music, but unsure what it was. Then, in a friend’s apartment in Paris, I turned on her giant 1950s credenza radio, and it was tuned to FIP. I was in love right away. I am far from the only one. FIP has a cult following of 757,000 daily listeners, with the average listener tuning in for 138 minutes. But outside of Europe, it is still little known.
"Its curation is so strange, so handmade, so beyond the safe hands of an algorithm that it keeps you on your toes...With FIP, you not only hand over control—you can do the same with any radio station after all—but you also become invested in where the music is going. It sharpens your mind."
At my first job, working in a small bureau of a British magazine, we would tune the office digital radio to FIP all day long. With essentially zero interruption, the radio provided a constant backdrop to the workday, but never became monotonous. When a particularly strange song would come on—say, a steel drum cover of Hotline Bling—my bureau chief would turn our chairs around to share a humorous glance. If you are like me, you will often be compelled to Shazam tracks to save for later. Luckily, FIP also keeps a running track list on its website.
In my next job, in a much bigger office, my FIP obsession had to be confined to headphones; the office speakers usually played a non-offensive-to-interesting mix of American pop that allowed my mind to wander. That is truly the key to FIP’s success as a work companion. Its curation is so strange, so handmade, so beyond the safe hands of an algorithm that it keeps you on your toes. When the algorithm sets the tone or you play your own music, your mind wanders, you skip tracks, and you bop around. With FIP, you not only hand over control—you can do the same with any radio station after all—but you also become invested in where the music is going. It sharpens your mind.
Now, I work from home, but of course, I keep my own digital radio tuned to FIP. It’s playing right now as I write this, some very long, extended electronic dance track. You can, of course, stream FIP on its site, which includes more genre-specific streams, but I would stick to the real deal myself. In nearly 10 years of listening to FIP, I have hardly ever heard the same song twice and have written the majority of my work to the soundtrack of its ever-changing tunes.
CREDITS
Charles W. McFarlane is a fashion historian and researcher, focusing on the intersection of military uniforms and popular fashion. Read more on his Substack, Combat Threads.
