I love studying folklore and legends. The stories that people passed down for a thousand years without any sort of marketing support are obviously saying something appealing about the basic human condition.
Although cover notes for classical music albums tend to say that the trill of flutes suggests mountain streams and so on, I don't think anybody listens to music with the expectation that they're going to be presented with a sort of landscape painting...
I'm not thinking about what needs to be on the radio. I'm not thinking about anything other than - I'm just going to let this music come out of me and not have any sort of preconceived notion of what I should do. I'm just going to do it.
People are like, 'Wow you started your own record label,' and treat me like I'm some sort of innovative genius, when I'm not at all. You've got the Internet and music - you put them together, and people hear your music.
During the time that my recording career seemed to be in a slump a music called disco came on the scene and literally took over radio stations as well as having radio stations created to play it which sort of negated my music as well as that of some ...
I've sort of had an investigatory relationship with being a musician. I really wasn't sure what I wanted to do. I felt I had had my run - I had done Jane's and I wasn't particularly interested in music anymore.
Well, I think, I certainly used backward music in Sea of Monsters. I can't remember in the Sea of Time. I would tend to do that all the time, you know? I tended to do all sorts of weird things. Just to get effects.
You're just sort of searching for this 'thing' and sometimes you get it and sometimes you don't. All music is imperfect, but in jazz since you're improvising, at least the way I play, I'm trying to follow my train of thought in a solo.
My songwriting process, and maybe loads of other people's, is just this sort of smashing together of emotions and stuff to make some music. It's kind of simple and really complex at the same time and, as you can see, incredibly hard to explain.
I still maintain several different outlets of artistry, like my music, photography, writing and all those things. I don't pigeonhole myself into one thing. I do all sorts of things, and that's so important to me.
The only thing I've ever wanted to do is really make people happy, offer some sort of positivity with music that I've written. The Chili Peppers do that for people. They're already established. I still want something that came out of me, and out of m...
I've always been a really really big Sheryl Crow fan. I just respect what she does in a way that she just remains true to her music and sort of has just been real. She isn't trying too hard ever.
I think that music is a lifestyle that you sort of intravenously plug into and unplug from when you do and don't need it. Some people live it 10 hours a day, some on weekends. It's no more important or non-important than that.
People sort of imagine Chris Morris and me sitting somewhere dark, with dripping taps and chilling background music. In fact, we like to sit on his roof in the sunshine - and there's an endless amount of just sitting there, going, 'So, erm, er, what ...
My secret ambition was always to provide music for animation films: something with an Indian theme, either a fairy tale or mythological tale or on the Krishna theme. I still have a very deep desire, but these sorts of chances don't always come.
Probably my favorite piece of music, as an album taken as a whole, is Bruce Springsteen's 'Greetings from Asbury Park.' I just think it's incredibly pure. It's a sound that sort of broke new ground, and I think it paved the way for a hundred people t...
I've had years of psychiatry, and I ask about every six months - it's sort of like getting your oil checked - I ask, 'I'm not an actual narcissist, am I?' The learned men of psychiatry assure me that I meet none of the medical criteria.
At the risk of sounding pedestrian, I'll be completely honest: the first thing I do in the morning is check Google News, partially because it seems sort of random and unbiased and partially because I tend to stay in hotels that don't necessarily have...
I draw hundreds and hundreds of pictures of sort of gnarly looking men, so I don't know what that tells you. People who look like... they're waiting for a sandwich that's never going to come. I don't know what's wrong with me.
Whether it's a 16-year old girl, or a mom, or a guy, or anybody, as long as they come up and they're excited to meet me 'cause they've had some sort of relationship with something I've created, it's the coolest thing ever. It never gets old. It's awe...
My mom has never been a big meddler and isn't, like, extremely opinionated or at least just doesn't voice it to me. She's sort of let me come into my own by myself, and I think that's just a testament to what my parents did in terms of raising us.
