Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I wish I could sing. I don't technically have a terrible voice, but it's certainly not as good as most of my friends. Whenever I hear myself on a record, it just reminds me I'm not a very good singer.
My mother and I were on welfare and food stamps until I was 18, so I've always had this ethos of, like, 'try and make a little bit of money now because you don't know what's going to happen tomorrow.'
I don't think there's anything wrong with not knowing how to play an instrument, but the rise of the non-musical producer has done away with musicianship and focused attention purely on the song's hook.
I feel like once the song is done, you put it out there and if people want to do bizarre remixes, if people want to make strange videos, great. You know, like chaos theory applied to the music business.
Since I stopped drinking my love life has taken a really serious hit. Romantic encounters that seemed like a really good idea at three o'clock in the morning on the Lower East Side? Less so in sobriety.
I'm not trying to look for pity or sympathy. I was just surprised that so many people in the world of entertainment seemed to be okay with misogyny and homophobia as long as they were profiting from it.
In the course of my life, I've made some happy songs but it's the more sort of like pathos-laden, emotional, melancholic music that either I make or that other people make that really resonates with me.
The idea of feeling old is much more the worry of a slightly younger person. When you are getting old, that becomes - psssh - completely secondary to the absolute understanding of how short your life is.
The strange thing about hotel rooms is that they look familiar and seem familiar and have many of the accoutrements that seem domestic and familiar, but they are really weird, alien and anonymous places.
There might be a lot of difference between Republicans and Democrats on key social issues like women's rights and health care. But when it comes to taking corporate cash, they're pretty much the same beast.
When 'Play' first came out, journalists didn't review it; it didn't get radio play. And then it became this big successful record and, I hate to admit this, I found myself liking the fame. I bought into it.
I was in bar about 15 years ago, a relationship had ended badly, I was very drunk and I thought I would convince myself to try and be gay. Like, at one point I didn't like coffee, then I learned to like it.
Now small fowls flew screaming over the yet yawning gulf; a sullen white surf beat against its steep sides; then all collapsed; and the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago.
There's not a lot of precedent for weird, bald musicians in the Lower East Side making records in their bedrooms and going on to sell a lot of copies of the record. Especially if you look at the pop climate.
Every single day the world seems like it is on the brink of falling apart. But then I look outside my window, and things look about the same as they did a week ago. It's almost a form of cognitive dissonance.
We need to finally accept that all sentient creatures are deserving of basic rights. I define basic rights as this -the ability to pursue life without having someone else's will involuntarily forced upon you.
If you make a record, you should ask yourself, 'Did it make someone cry, in a good way, not a bad way?' There should almost be subjective emotional criteria for evaluating work, instead of just profitability.
These new metal bands are going out, getting drunk and going to strip clubs, and they'll be doing the same in thirty years. There isn't even an interesting self-destructive quality to it . . . it's just dumb.
When you're signed to a big label you're always in the position of convincing them, especially now because labels are barely keeping the lights on, so getting them to spend a little bit of money is really hard.
The term 'renaissance man' is always bandied about. I don't think that applies to me. You think about Leonardo da Vinci, and he was a painter and a physicist and an architect, and that is a true renaissance man.
My interest in gospel music and liturgical art and Biblically-inspired literature has nothing to do with organised religion and everything to do with human beings trying to figure out their place on this planet.
When you look at the consequences of climate change, at rainforest deforestation, at antibiotic resistance, these are not necessarily political issues, but rather issues that have the ability to threaten our species.
NASA is an utterly fascinating place, and the fact that the buildings look so anonymous almost make it more fascinating. You walk by a generic office-park-looking building, and you have no idea what's going on inside.
NASA is an utterly fascinating place, and the fact that the buildings look so anonymous almost makes it more fascinating. You walk by a generic office-park-looking building, and you have no idea what's going on inside.
I made a record in 1996 called 'Animal Rights' that was a very difficult, very dark punk-rock record. Of all the records I've made, it's my favorite one. It's also the one that got the worst reviews and sold the worst.
What makes me vulnerable is any genuine expression of emotion in the presence of another person. It makes me vulnerable and my inclination is, of course, immediately to back away from anything that makes me vulnerable.
I'll look through 'Us Weekly' and I'll see a picture of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Anniston. And I'm like, 'Wow, they just... they look so good. Even if they're like just wearing jeans and a t-shirt, they still look great.'
One of the main reasons I'm vegan is because I'm ethically lazy. My friends who eat meat or who eat eggs have to sometimes wrestle with the ethical consequences of their actions. By being vegan, I take the easy way out.
Since I was really little, I've just always had an obsession with, not just science fiction, but science and space. And also because as time passes and the more advanced science becomes, the more interesting it becomes.
If we base our belief systems on the humble assumption that the complexities of the world are ontologically beyond our understanding, then maybe our belief systems will make more sense and end up causing less suffering.
When Britney shaves off all her hair and beats paparazzi with umbrellas - that's what celebrities are supposed to do. They're not supposed to be reasonable, middle-aged guys drinking organic tea talking about semiotics.
When I went to university, I was a philosophy major, but because I'm not very bright I chose to study philosophy at a performing arts school, maybe because the philosophy program there wasn't too rigorous or challenging.
I have no perspective as regards my work. One reason I put out records and books is people respond to it, and it enables you to actually see the work more clearly. It's a form of therapy for me. Sometimes abusive therapy.
A lot of people do talk about the demise of the album, but I still believe that if an artist tries hard to make a great album, people will buy it and listen to it as an album, rather than just a collection of random songs.
There are viable (and usually better) alternatives to the use of animals for food, sport, clothing, & experimentation. I beg you to discontinue any actions that might cause or condone animal torture, abuse, or destruction.
But on a utilitarian level, I realize that to try to accomplish the greatest good for the greatest number of people, sometimes we have to become salesmen for what we believe, and part of being a salesman is being effective.
I walk out my front door in New York and I'm out on the street and there are people everywhere. L.A. is so much more spread out, so it's really easy in L.A. to have a little more isolation and to just not see as many people.
You have climate change and antibiotic resistance which are two of the biggest horses of the apocalypse, and they're basically breathing on our necks, and there's no political will or effort being expended to deal with them.
I remember New York in the '80s as a place with vacant lots that would eventually give over to nature. Weeds would grow up, squirrels would move in. That entropy is gone now. It's too expensive to let a vacant lot go natural.
I have to say that being a vegan in 1986 or whenever was a lot different than being a vegan in 2012. You'd go to health foods stores and basically your choice was between Mung beans and nutritional yeast, and that's about it.
The solution probably doesn't look like the problem. If we have this propensity to worry, to be anxious, to be depressed, to be angry - focusing on the worry, anxiety, depression, and anger? Probably not gonna be the solution.
If Nirvana had remained a small, underground punk rock band, Kurt Cobain would still be alive. And he'd probably be living in Seattle, getting kind of fat and balding, be relatively happy and producing records for other people.
So man's insanity is heaven's sense, and wandering from all mortal reason, man comes at last to that celestial thought, which, to reason, is absurd and frantic; and weal or woe, feels then uncompromised, indifferent as his God.
I think the ideal job in that alternative universe would be to lead whitewater rafting trips through the Grand Canyon. So maybe I'd be a guy leading whitewater rafting trips at the Grand Canyon. Or maybe a professional skydiver.
A great song is a great song, whether it's on vinyl or CD or cassette or reel to reel or mp3. Then again, that might be an overly optimistic view, but I do think that great music will transcend the medium in which it is delivered.
You can sit down with Reason or Ableton and literally in a couple of hours make a very good-sounding record. But then a lot of people become contented with that, rather than pushing themselves to making something that sounds great.
To paraphrase Paul from the New Testament, he has a great soliloquy about love, where he's basically saying, if I've figured out the secrets of the universe but I don't have love, figuring out the secrets of universe means nothing.
I won't complain about touring, because I really do believe that a public-figure musician complaining about being a public-figure musician is just absurd. Like, 'Boo hoo hoo! I have to stand on stage and people pay attention to me!'
What fascinates me about addiction and obsessive behavior is that people would choose an altered state of consciousness that's toxic and ostensibly destroys most aspects of your normal life, because for a brief moment you feel okay.
If you and I become vegans, the global consequences aren't going to be that much. But if we can get a few hundred million people to become a little more aware and cut back on their animal consumption, the consequences will be great.