A lot of our music came out of a lot of weird psychology and weird emotions. When you play the whole body of work, you get tossed all over the place. It's not easy listening. It's not even comfortable to listen to.
If I had to play only for people who liked the music because they heard it on the radio, it wouldn't make me happy. That's why I'm working so hard to have, yes, a profile as an artist, but also a profile as a DJ.
So dance music is now pop music. So now, as a dance producer, what do I have to do? So I'm starting to do alien music, because pop is not pop anymore; we need to go alien to be independent.
When I was recording music, I'd record all the parts myself, and I wouldn't let other people in; that's essentially what Blood Orange is the result of; me trying to find the most comfortable I can be with everything.
Dancehall has always had a homophobic problem, but you go to dance parties in Jamaica, and some of the biggest dancers are kinda gay, just not outspoken about it. Dancehall was the first kind of music I was DJing, and it was always more about the rhy...
I want to make hand-held music, undiminished by the need to make everybody in the world listen at once. The goal is to ride into the sunset, stereo blasting, and all of what's got you worried will disappear in the rear view mirror!
I work very closely with my publisher and just give them tons and tons of music, and then they link that with different songwriters and stuff. I'm basically a workaholic. So, I figured I might as well just start working outside.
I'm not a big equipment guy; I think that people are a little bit shocked by that. I really don't care about gear in general. I care about people and their intentions to make music - it doesn't matter what equipment you have.
I start really missing London when I go away. I have a little flat, but very central. I live above a pub and you'd think it'd be a nightmare, but I like hearing the music and it's quite comforting.
We make music for a living. Like I've always said, if you like what you're doing, you're halfway there; if someone else likes it, that's even better. If they don't like it, at least you like it. Not to be selfish, but you kind of have to be.
I was a folk singer who became totally over the edge with country music. I found my voice and style working with Gram Parsons. I learned how to listen to George Jones records and the Louvin Brothers.
When it comes to grunge or even just Seattle, I think there was one band that made the definitive music of the time. It wasn't us or Nirvana, but Mudhoney. Nirvana delivered it to the world, but Mudhoney were the band of that time and sound.
When I first put out music, people didn't know what I looked like. They called it a new type of something; they couldn't put a genre on it - it was where indie and urban kind of meet in the middle. I thought that was quite exciting.
When people say, 'Your music was the music of the Seventies,' I say, 'So was discoteque.' The Seventies was also the highest peak of heavy metal. Pick a genre - they were all alive.
Styx has their own style of music, and I think that's justifiable, the same way that Asia and Yes have had - Yes particularly has a unique style that seems to have transcended all styles of music for 43 years.
My speech is really important to me, but the thing is at the moment it can't be more important than my singing. Until I'm an established name all over the world, my speech won't be more important than my music.
I would like to involve myself in some black music. I would like to do some blues and some gospel music. I want to try stuff from other genres and try to widen my musical base.
'White Rabbit' was mostly done in about two days, the music in about half an hour. The music is a 'Bolero' rip-off and the lyrics a rearrangement of 'Alice in Wonderland.' You take two spectacular hits and throw them together, and it's hard to miss.
I feel that when Chad is in the room, I can tap into this other thing where music comes from. I don't know. It's just this really magical, special connection and relationship.
Basically we just created our own label, but again we just did it to document our own music and create our own thing, so the major labels were just always out of our picture, we're not interested.
I discovered the same thing Gram Parsons did, that soul music and country music are practically identical. Based off of the same chord structures, and the songs are of heartache and loss. The main connection is they both came up in church.
