Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
You can't be idealistic in this world and not be crazy
It's a matter of keeping people on a spontaneous edge.
You can't be idealistic in this world and not be crazy.
People sometimes have a very hard time accepting change.
The idealists will always be in society, and we will survive
The idealists will always be in society, and we will survive.
Man, Dick Dale shreds. He's welcomed to anybody's bar mitzvah.
If you can make art with sound, can't you make music with objects?
We're not on the outside looking in, we're on the outside looking out.
Eye was a great discovery. He is one of the great vocalists of all time.
I have wit in my work and a sense of humor, but I do not use irony in any way
I have wit in my work and a sense of humor, but I do not use irony in any way.
I see myself and many artists like me as the torchbearers through these dark ages.
I was always an outsider, proud of being an outsider. I always reveled in the outsiders.
I have no doubts. I know what gets in the way and I know what encourages me to do more work.
Each record in the 'Book of Angels' series is meant to be unique in terms of the compositions.
One thing that I do ask myself when I'm in the creative process is, 'Does the world need this?'
And I try to be as diplomatic as I can, but it always ends up being a psychodrama up there on stage.
I'm constantly tortured, and that's why I say happiness is irrelevant. Happiness is for children and yuppies.
I'm not a practicing kabbalist. I'm not a spiritual master. I'm not a rabbi. I don't - but it's part of who I am.
You need to believe in something that's bigger than yourself. I think that's what everybody wants to believe in that.
I have not practiced saxophone since 1980. I mean, not one note. I do not pick it up in my house, and that's the end of it.
When I'm writing, sometimes it gets to that place where I feel like the piece is writing itself and I'm trying not to get in the way
When I'm writing, sometimes it gets to that place where I feel like the piece is writing itself and I'm trying not to get in the way.
Great musicians accept everything that they hear and find something good. They take what they like and they throw away what they don't like
Great musicians accept everything that they hear and find something good. They take what they like and they throw away what they don't like.
I'm getting ready to write a piece now, and it's been six months thinking about it, changing the instrumentation, changing the name, doing more reading.
I have about two or three people, we don't have an office, we don't even have a dedicated phone line. We do it out of our own homes, and we make it work.
I feel like there are messages. I feel like there are angels. I feel that there is a legacy and an energy. And I feel that it's possible to tap into that.
I mean I have had a very combative relationship with critics because I'm very impatient with people that don't give my work the respect I feel it deserves.
I create work, and I devote myself to the creative process, and I try to, you know, stay pure in that process and be worthy of the messages that I receive.
Discipline is important as long as you're having a good time. What I always did was I did what I enjoyed, and I think that's why I don't have any grey hairs.
That's where I began to ask questions that maybe don't have one specific answer. And the more people you get answers from, the richer the environment becomes.
One of the reasons I started Tzadik, which is my own label, is to keep things in print. I got tired of labels dropping things out of print when they don't sell.
I put together the influences of my life in as clear a way as I possibly can, in the same way that Beethoven or Schoenberg or Bach put their influences together.
Music is about people for me. It's not about sounds. It's about people; it's about putting people into challenging situations. And for me, challenges are opportunities.
No one sits in front of a drum set and thinks they invented it all out of whole cloth. The fact that the set is there means that you've got some dues to pay to Baby Dodds.
As soon as you get a certain amount of attention, then everybody kinda wants to start taking pot shots at you. All your old friends that supported you don't support you any more.
What happens when you get to the age of 60 is that you have no more doubts. I know why I'm here on this planet. I know what I need to do. I know what is a distraction and what isn't.
It's a blast to watch. It's a lot more interesting live than it is on record. I mean, it really is a theatrical event. It's a sporting event! Cause you never know what's gonna happen.
It breaks even. We lose ten, twenty grand every year. But then the people who are working say, Look, I'll kick this back in, I don't need to take this profit share. It's very cooperative.
That was my challenge as a composer. Like with anything, to keep yourself interested in doing what you do, you set yourself challenges. So I said, Okay, I'll try to write a hundred tunes in a year.
My solo music - I get up onstage, I improvise and it's my improvisation. When I get up onstage with Fred Frith and Mike Patton, then we're improvising together. Then it's not my music; it's our music.
Like you have seven people with their hands up. I gotta make a choice. Y'know, that's tough. Sometimes I gotta go with someone that has an idea and make several calls in a row, because they got an idea.
I used to look at composing music as problem solving. But as I get older, it's not about problem solving anymore. There are no solutions, because there are no problems. You just turn the tap and it flows out.
That is a lot of the reason I do what I do, to really spread the word and spread information and turn people onto different things they may not be, y'know, aware of. That is what Naked City is certainly about
That is a lot of the reason I do what I do, to really spread the word and spread information and turn people onto different things they may not be, y'know, aware of. That is what Naked City is certainly about.
Well, in Japan, I have got a group of musicians that I have worked with a lot, that concentrate just on the hardcore stuff, say, that Naked City has been working on. We have like a repertoire of sixty songs now.
I run around, I listen to a lot of music, go to a lot of concerts. And when I see someone that gases me, I try to go out of my way to involve them somehow in what I'm doing or get involved in what they're doing.
I'm not striving for happiness, I'm trying to get some work done. And sometimes the best work is done under doubt. Constantly rethinking and re-evaluating what you're doing, working and working until it's finished.