First Attempt

Well, suppose I should introduce myself. I'm Josh, 21, I live in
australia, and I've recently taken an interest in lucid dreaming as a
way to help regulate my sleeping habits.

For a few months now, I've had incredibly sporadic sleeping habits,
usually staying awake upwards of 30 hours at a time, and sleeping either
for only a few, or for 16 or longer, probably as a direct result of
sitting up playing videogames all night constantly. I'd heard about
Lucid Dreaming a year or so ago, and started reading up on it. At the
moment, I'm following a few online guides, and made my first attempt and
started my dream diary last night.

Most of the guides stress the importance of dream recollection. They
said I'd probably be able to only write 1-2 sentances about my dreams on
my first attempt, but this morning, I managed half an a4 page, only
briefly describing the events in a way that can easily jog my memory
when I read them later. (Eg, for fairly long sequence involving me and
my friends shooting one another on a train with weapons from the game
Halo, I just wrote 'We played halo on a train' rather then going into
any specific detail about the sequence.) I guess this means I've got
passable natural dream recollection, so does this mean I'll find it
easier to improve my dream recollection/attain lucidity?

Also, I was interested in the effects of playing music while I'm
sleeping on the process of attaining lucidity. I thought perhaps, if I
run the same playlist every night while I'm asleep, I can use specific
verses or sections of my favourite songs as triggers to become
concious. Will this help, or will it cause problems?

Actually it's better to go into more detail when writing a dream journal. After you've written down a lot you can go back and find simmilarities, or things that show up in most or all of your dreams. These are called dream signs and when you figure out what they are you will notice them while dreaming and this may hep you become lucid.

Well, what level of detail would you say works best? Are we talking writing on the same level as a short story, describing every action or detail so that someone else could read it and still understand?

Just a short summary is what I do. I don't try to put everylittle thing I can remember, just the big details that stand out. And as for how you write it, it's probably best to do it so that you can understand it well, whichever way works for you.