'For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge' took a year to record; that's why the playing on it might sound somewhat labored. 'Balance,' on the other hand, was written and recorded in only four months, so the whole process was quicker and more immediate.
I've always had a love for poetry and when I got signed to a record label I thought, 'How odd that I'm doing a record before a book of poetry,'
Those early steps are very important in understanding the evolution. But in themselves, maybe now you need the later records to understand the significance of the earlier records!
We stuck the record head so it kept on recording over and over on top of itself and played keyboard notes into it to create this ghost repetition melody.
To write lyrics and sing stuff used to be a real chore for me, especially before this 'Diamond Eyes' record. I was spending years making records.
You know, I'm a fan of Laurie Anderson. One of my favorite records is 'The Ugly One With the Jewels,' a spoken-word record. It's an extraordinary album.
Normally, you go into the recording studio, make a record and then take it on the road and you think... wow... I could have done THIS to it, or something.
Do not let any record company disturb your creative flow. You are not writing for the record company. You're writing for the public.
For instance, if you're playing a record with drums - horns would sound nice to enhance it so you get a record with horns and slip it in at certain times.
The type of mixing that was out then was blending from one record to the next or waiting for the record to go off and wait for the jock to put the needle back on.
I think the greatest records we've ever heard, from Zeppelin to Purple to Sabbath to The Who, were all recorded in the studio live.
In the '80s, the way radio was programmed, if you didn't have a hit record you weren't going to be able to make any more records. That was it, period.
Bob Dylan's first couple of records in the 60's weren't considered cover records, but he only wrote one or two original songs on each album.
I think it's ridiculous to try to sell records to teenagers, because teenagers don't buy my records. And there ain't that many teenagers out there in the marketplace.
I just wanted to make a record that wasn't escapism. Like, I didn't want to write another record that was devoid of meaningful content.
I usually make records very quickly. I usually go in and record them and mix them, and I'm done within a couple of weeks.
I approach writing stories as a recorder. I think of my role as some kind of reporting device - recording and projecting.
We recorded that trio and it's out on the Knitting Factory label. I've got another record in the can with that group and Marc, which I'll hopefully finish some time before next summer.
You have all these song titles and song time, and you put it in a certain order, and you slap a cover on it. That's a record. That's how I've seen all my records.
Something is better than nothing. Doin' anything for a man, there's investments involved, there's time and production. It's better to give him ten bucks and get a record out than to never record the cat.
I developed the Clock Theory to help me time records; you know, spin the record back two revolutions or whatever and then play the break, spin the other one back two, play, like that.
