I work on an open plan floor that is full of lots of different departments, so lots of different work goes on- phone conferences, team meetings, people on phones, auditing- lots of different sorts of noise. Plus different parts of the business have different cultures you get lots of different kinds of behaviour- loud talkers, ridiculous mobile ring tones, old-man smokers laughs, people who seem to spend the majority of their working day doing personal business on the phone etc.
Without headphones to block out this brown noise I’d end up on the roof with a rifle, but I listen to podcasts (talk) and music through one in-ear headphone, so with the other ear I can hear the occassional “Hey!!” that comes across the partitions.
That said, I can’t do any work with words (i.e. writing an explanation of sales analysis, essay writing) if I’m listening to talk- I just can’t concentrate, but for my uni. work I can sketch while I have the kids screaming at my feet and my wife and I trying to talk- must be a left/ right brain thing.
On another note, I heard that the muzak company automatically licences any song that makes the top twenty, so quite often you’ll get in an elevator and hear a quite serious/ protest song (i.e “London Calling”, “Beds are Burning”) done in the muzak style, but without any hint on irony.