Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
My father was hard to know and gave little indication that there was much to know. He claimed he remembered almost nothing about his childhood.
I think that art, and making music or comedy, is a way of positing yourself on the map and then trying to find other people out there with you.
I think alone time is good to know how to be alone with your own thoughts. I think it just helps you kind of be a better, more grounded person.
I'm interested in the crevices, and the grotesque, and the unsavory. That started out when I was young... I've never quite been able to shake that.
Nothing is as nice as plugging in your guitar and turning up the volume really loud, just seeing what kind of beautiful noise you can make with it.
You can't bury a part of yourself that's so innate to who you've been, even if it's not for the sake of anything other than a pure enjoyment of it.
I think there's a lot of wonderful comics that leave you hanging in a state of apprehension or anxiety before alleviating that tension with a joke.
With so much of music blurring the lines between ersatz and authenticity, at least the 'Rock Band' game is a tribute to rock rather than an affront.
Nutty fans are fine with me, as I have no known nut allergy. In general, though, it's best to carry an EpiPen to deal with outbreaks of fan nuttiness.
That's so rare in the world of TV or film to have a genuine friendship turn into something that people watch, that people relate to. That's so unique.
I grew up outside of Seattle and have lived here my whole life, and I think that there is a culture of questioning and guilt. Almost an 'anti-ambition.'
A lot of music for me was about - I mean aside from the fun and challenge of writing and being really good friends with my bandmates - getting to perform.
What I value most in new music today is strangeness, oddity. Passion. And humor. I listen to a lot of hip-hop because it combines so many things like that.
A lot of music for me was about - I mean, aside from the fun and challenge of writing and being really good friends with my bandmates - getting to perform.
I think one of the reasons I haven't been doing music is because I think that some of my performance, like, needs are being taken care of in other mediums.
I like to connect with people through my work. That's my favorite way - meetings of the minds, fans at a show. Those are nice mediated ways of hanging out.
From the ashes of Bauhaus, Love and Rockets transformed its grandiosity and excesses into boldness and virtuosity. Plus, it wasn't afraid of a catchy hook or two.
I think a lot of people want stories or lives to have very distinct beginnings, middles, and endings. Generally, I think things are a little more fluid than that.
I don't think you need to sound like from where you're from. But I think there is something magical and powerful about encompassing something fully and singularly.
I definitely love performing live because there are moments of spontaneity. And as much as you're performing on stage, I feel like the audience is performing, too.
'Beasts of the Southern Wild' was one of those films that I felt like I could dismiss because it received so many accolades, but then I watched it and was won over.
I think one of the scariest things about depression is that it exists along with the happiness and the joy, and it kind of plays with it and sucks the color from it.
I think short-term goals are important. Trying to set a missive for yourself for the entire year can be daunting, and it can feel too easy to fail or fall short of that.
You can never underestimate that moment of somebody explaining your life to you, something you thought was inexplicable, through music. That was the way out of loneliness.
I always find that nostalgia is sort of like memory without the pain. And that's why it feels so good to kind of bask in that, and I think it can be deceptively comforting.
No matter what people are struggling with, or based on whatever. Sexuality, ethnicity, economic status, size. I don't wish smallness for anyone. It's a terrible place to live.
I like how blogging emulates fandom because it's so completist and spontaneous. It really mirrors the way people listen to music, and I like that fluidity with online content.
I've mostly been focusing on writing, and I've really enjoyed not playing music. It will always be part of my life, but I don't feel the immediate need to be playing for people.
I think that the most well-intentioned, optimistic, creative people often live for the moment, and for 'Portlandia,' our goals were always very sort of short-term and attainable.
After Sleater-Kinney broke up in 2006 I had very little desire to play music. It took well over three years before picking up a guitar meant anything to me other than an exercise.
There is a certain comfort that comes from feeling intellectually apart from phenomena. That you have the luxury of time to reflect or apply scholarly thinking to art and culture.
I get mad at myself when I get news from Twitter before I get it from a regular news source. Then I'm off to a bad start: getting the second-hand, filtered experience all day long.
I think when you're writing from your own life, it's hard because you realize that people have their own assessment of how they look, and they don't know how you will describe them.
Celebrity culture is... it's not something that I'm attracted to. I guess I don't think of myself in that way, but potentially other people do. I feel I'm at the far periphery of that.
I have no problem spending money on a great meal with friends or a flight to see somebody that I love, versus something like a fancy car. I don't need a fancy car. I don't need a giant TV.
I think that half of us feel fraudulent in our lives anyway. There's that strange disconnect of not really knowing what we're doing sometimes, or why it matters. It's our existential crisis.
Only in retrospect can I find clues to my father's gayness. Sometimes the dull detritus of our pasts become glaring strands once you realize they form a pattern, a lighted path to the present.
With Sleater-Kinney, we did a lot of improvisation in our live shows, and even our process of songwriting involved bringing in disparate parts and putting them together to form something cohesive.
Practice. Learn and then unlearn - that's the trick in finding your own style of playing. You can't merely emulate, you have to innovate, or at the very least create your own path into the process.
Twitter is sort of version of labeling, except with 140 characters instead of a labelmaker. It's the way of calling things out for what they are, wearing badges. Twitter is like the new Scarlet Letter.
I wrote so much about fandom and participation for NPR that I eventually realized my most fertile way of participating in music is to actually play it, at least in a way that made the most sense to me.
Over the years, music put a weapon in my hand and words in my mouth it backed me up and shielded me, it shook me and scared me and showed me the way; music opened me up to living and being and feeling.
Over the years, music put a weapon in my hand and words in my mouth, it backed me up and shielded me, it shook me and scared me and showed me the way; music opened me up to living and being and feeling.
My own relationship to food was healthy. I was lean and athletic with a high metabolism. I could eat half a pizza with a side of breadsticks and wash it down with soda. I never dieted or denied myself food.
With Portlandia, I don't think our intention is always to find something funny. Sometimes the humor comes from taking something really seriously. We're okay with making somebody feel uncomfortable or uneasy.
With Rock Band, you can play along to Black Sabbath or Nirvana and possibly find new ways of appreciating their artistry by being allowed to perform parallel to it. Rock Band puts you inside the guts of a song.
I think people would describe a lot of Sleater-Kinney as unsettling. And I don't think our best moments have sonic assonance to them. I think that we are best with a little bit of... a caustic attitude and tone.
At its core, kitsch feels like something less than art; it panders to the middle and is flagrantly anti-art, though it often apes or references art. This referential, ersatz quality is why it's so fun to collect.
From dancing around to Michael Jackson and Madonna as a kid to having my mind blown by the first sounds of punk and indie rock, to getting to play my own songs and have people listen, music is what got me through.
It was writing about music for NPR - connecting with music fans and experiencing a sense of community - that made me want to write songs again. I began to feel I was in my head too much about music, too analytical.