Top 96 Quotes & Sayings by Washed Out

We lived in Atlanta for a couple of years, and had a lot of fun, but my best work happens when I isolate myself. It's all about turning inward.

I normally start at the computer with something really simple like a four-bar loop of a drum sample or a bass line. And then I just start adding layers of synthesizers.

Over a year's time, I felt like I squeezed in five years of touring experience, which was a really huge help moving forward.

I took piano lessons when I was really young, like five years old, and I didn't really enjoy that very much. It was kind of too strict. So when I was probably 11 or 12, I started playing guitar and just kind of taught myself.

For the most part, the real work is done in the songwriting stage and recording; the next step is presenting to people.

For the longest time, I was trying to be DJ Shadow, I think. But I slowly developed my own style. It was trial and error, for sure.

Where I grew up in the middle of Georgia, hip-hop is king, and on Friday and Saturday nights, local DJs do mixes. It's a great mix of local stuff and then some of the bigger hits and remixes of the hits, and it just has this nice flow with a dirty-South sound to everything.

I want people to make sense of what I'm talking about.

In your imagination, you can perfect things in a way you can't do in your everyday life.

I've struggled with depression before. For me, music was always a very positive way to will myself out of that situation.

I'm without a doubt a producer first. The lyrics happen towards the tail-end of the process, mainly because they're more stream-of-consciousness. It's very rare that I'm going to tell a really concrete story.

I do try to structure everything in a way that's very much like a pop song. I try to keep the arrangements really simple, just to make everything essential.

When we're back home, I feel pretty domesticated.

It's a weird dynamic - I guess there is a fine line between hope and sadness. Sometimes you can be feeling both at the same time.

Something on mainstream radio is very in your face with the vocals. I tried that, and it just doesn't feel like Washed Out. It's got to have that haziness to it.

There are things I can accomplish in the studio via manipulation on the computer or some kind of effect that are nearly impossible to do live. On the flip side, there are some things that happen live that can't be pulled off in the studio.

I'm not a very technical musician at all.

I don't think it's an exciting thing to move back in with your parents.

I was gonna work in a university, but no one was hiring.

I personally love the record-making more than the actually performing and travelling. It's funny, the drastic shift in lifestyle that comes with it. It certainly satisfies my more adventurous side, but it leaves little time for contemplation and all of that.

I just have the normal ringtone, unfortunately.

I try to be as optimistic as I can. I feel like that's the beautiful thing about art and music. It can take you places, and they can be a positive influence. A very soothing influence. Honestly, I feel like there's enough pain and terrible things that happen in life. That's beautiful thing in art, you can really idealize things.

My parents live out in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of this peach orchard. It's actually Peach County, one of the largest peach-growing counties in Georgia. It's very rural, and there is nothing much going on, so I guess that's had a big influence on everything as far as just not having much to do.

Escapism or nostalgia, for me, is not about having a terrible life and trying to get away via imaginary ideas or something.

One of the great things about music is how it can take you places.

There are certain sounds that have a loaded past. Like the sound of a harp, if you go back to old movies, represents a dream sequence; it transports you there.

Making music is pretty much the only thing I can do.

Ultimately, what interests me is using exotic sounds in my songs.

I get very bored easily. I'm a child of the Internet or whatever; I want more and more of new and interesting things.

I like an even-keeled, slow-paced job.

I definitely enjoy the kind of magic that happens being on stage with a group when everything's working. The vibe when that's happening gets even better if the audience is involved and you can feel that interaction. That's something you don't get with your headphones on in a studio; it's much different.

I just make up lyrics off the top of my head. A lot of times, there's a phrase I really like, and I kind of build the song around that.

Being outside is a loose theme on 'Paracosm.' Acoustic-sounding instruments have that warmth to them that is really important to communicate. It was really important for me to tell a story - my favorite records have a narrative feel.

I definitely enjoy my time by myself - and that's kind of the weird thing about touring; you're kind of constantly surrounded by people - but I actually do enjoy going out and doing things and being around people.

When I look back at the record and listen to it, I can sort of see where I was at when I was making it - these brief little moments, different places I was at emotionally.

I don't really write all that well with others.

For some, being involved in a scene is a great thing because the social element can drive creativity. For me, though, it's never really been like that. It's the opposite. I've always had this instinct to escape.

Honestly, I've just made music so long by myself, in some ways I don't feel I'm a very good collaborator.

I love listening to pop radio.

The beautiful thing about working with new instruments is that you sort of approach it with a fresh perspective.

My general taste is towards the melancholy.

I felt like I was building this world brick by brick with each layer of instrumentation I was doing. I could see it growing in some ways. I feel like most writers feel the same way. You're almost living inside of this magic world that you're building.

Maybe in the future, you'll be able to understand what I'm saying. I'm going more for an atmospheric vibe in my songs. And I really don't want to ruin the illusions people may create for themselves.

The music is at this weird intersection of dance music and indie music. It's not quite dancey enough to do a full-blown DJ set, and it wasn't quite rock enough for a rock band. But I guess it's what makes us unique - drawing from a lot of different influences.

The way I work is by infinitely playing a very simple loop over and over, and then I start layering things.

I'm very happy in my life, but I do feel that music has a power to transport you to places or to beautiful moments in your past.

I have a little basement studio set up here at my house, and I do probably 80 percent of the recording here on my own. With multi-tracking technology, I can play various parts on top of one another.

When I think about making 'Within,' it was not a very fun experience at all.

I listen to a lot of different kinds of music, and I feel like I can pull ideas from practically anything. You name it - I'll probably like it.

I never want to make a complete, 180 reactional record. I wanted a connection to what I've done in the past but still move forward and evolve.

The way that I sing is very mumbled-together, and so I guess I'm kind of stuck with it now.

I try to stay on a pretty normal schedule of nine-to-five.

When you work this intensely on something, the recording process becomes a bit like cabin fever. I shut everything out and, for a while, I totally lost perspective. To an outsider, I imagine the whole recording process sounds like torture.

I was definitely the kid in the back of the class with his head down the whole time not wanting to speak up and say anything.

I know of some guitar-based rock bands that refuse to record anything that they can't play live. But some of the best stuff I come up with are studio-based performances - bringing out whatever accident I had in the studio and building a song around that.

It is easy to get an interesting loop to happen, but it becomes a collage when the song and loop are constantly changing.

I don't think I would change anything. I think we've done a fairly good job of remaining sane and making the right decisions.

I do have the personnel that we use in the back of my head when I'm working, but I also don't want to limit myself.

I've always, in some way, incorporated sampling into my work.

I've always written pop songs. I tend to take inspiration from more experimental genres, like ambient music, but at the root of the song, it's verse-chorus-verse.