I say it is indispensable to look ahead of and behind oneself in the present. If there is such a thing as tradition, and I believe there is, it can only exist in the sense of the most profound movements of culture.
I am very much afraid of definitions, and yet one is almost forced to make them. One must take care, too, not to be inhibited by them.
At school, I was always daydreaming and fiddling in inkwells, but I had to learn to grow up and become articulate. And doing that was what brought me into writing songs. It's like therapy for me, because it exposes what I'm really thinking.
Good composition is like a suspension bridge; each line adds strength and takes none away... Making lines run into each other is not composition. There must be motive for the connection. Get the art of controlling the observer – that is composition...
If a certain activity, such as painting, becomes the habitual mode of expression, it may follow that taking up the painting materials and beginning work with them will act suggestively and so presently evoke a flight into the higher state.
When you're an artist, you can only do your own stuff. Even if you only write for other people, you're really more focused on yourself. So while everybody's out touring, I'm working on records.
I don't think that I'm over his influence but they probably don't look like Picassos; Picasso himself would probably have thrown up looking at my pictures.
I suppose I would still prefer to sit under a tree with a picnic basket rather than under a gas pump, but signs and comic strips are interesting as subject matter.
You know, at 35 or at 38 or 40 you really start to see what your body could look like if you just don't do anything all winter long. So that's another motivating factor, our vanity.
But Eddie does not make all the decisions. Eddie can listen to reason; Eddie can be swayed or talked in or out of certain things. Eddie allows other people to lead in this band and to have certain roles that are very fundamental to the decision-makin...
Eddie is a natural leader. Jeff and I have been very much in control of previous bands we've worked in. But the way Eddie grew into being the leader of this band was the most gradual, slow and respectful process that I've ever been involved in.
People think of Jews as the Woody Allen stereotype, the nebbishy kind of thing, but that's not the kind of Jews I know. I know plenty of Israelis and plenty of tough guys that are Jewish. So, I think it makes sense that Jews play metal.
When I've produced a song, I try to record a vocal over it, and sometimes it becomes really hard. Sometimes I've already said a lot that I want to say within the production. The vocal is just adding to it, rather than it being a song.
I like driving. A lot. I think that's something I just enjoy the most. I can, at a moment's notice, drive across the country if, you know, I had to.
When I first arrived in Houston, I was fascinated with the elaborate styles of cowboy boots and thought they were incredibly exotic. They also seemed to be a central part of a specifically 'Texan' identity, one distinct from being 'American.'
Obviously you have to have talent in order to play so you can't overlook that, but we won't overlook the character issue when it comes to talent because if they have talent and they don't have character, it's going to be very difficult to coach that ...
It's like pulling teeth to get me to do photo shoots. And I don't mind doing interviews if they're by phone, but I hate to go sit down and have to meet somebody somewhere, you know what I mean.
If I hear a conversation and somebody says something intriguing, my first thought is, 'Is that a song?' I write all year long, and at the end of the year I pull these forty or fifty things out and say which of these things do I want to record.
There's always a part of my brain saying: 'Stop getting comfortable. Don't relax.' Because I find it difficult to write when I'm happy. I have to go out there and get battered up and bruised to write anything. I have to feel something.
I grew up in the suburbs of a small town on the south coast where the only opportunity I ever got to wear anything smart was a funeral, so I had never owned a piece of clothing worth more than £40.
I think the indie-rock world is very creative. They're always looking for something new, and I think of all the instruments we have in the world, the ones that are the most creative and interesting are the electronic ones. There are so many sounds an...
