A Quote by Bill Paxton

I think I got an Instamatic camera when I was 8 years old, and ever since then, I've liked to record things. I don't know why. Maybe it's just to kind of try to leave some kind of record behind.
My first record I ever got was 'Full Moon Fever.' My dad gave me a copy when I was maybe nine years old or something. And I listened to the heck out of that record. I loved that record.
I feel less and less like that every year, and I guess maybe even more so with every new record that I put out. I just think, as the years go by, it's harder and harder to really find a reason to be annoyed that you made something that people want to continuously talk about. Certainly there are contexts in which the record can be discussed which will get me on the defensive and make me want to put some kind of calibration or some kind of context on what the record means in relation to my career as a whole.
I got on the phone with the president of my label and I said, "Obviously, I write songs in a lot of styles and play a lot of different kinds of music. We're getting toward the end of our business collaboration. If you could envision a record that you wanted to hear from me, what kind of record would it be?" It wasn't like asking him to fill an order, it was really just a conversation. For all the things I'd ever asked him, this was one thing I'd never asked, and I don't know why. So I was curious. And the thing that he was most interested in hearing was a solo record.
I don't think that much anymore in terms of 'write a record, record a record, tour a record,' because in my own mind, things have changed, in that I'm just an ongoing artist. I'm not quite sure what the next project needs to be until it presents himself, and then I know. I just follow dutifully while I'm being led.
I grew up with vinyl records and remember the pleasure and the kind of buzz that I got from buying a beautiful vinyl record with the sleeve and the lyrics - all that kind of tactile experience that you could get from an old vinyl record.
I call it "being interrupted by success." We had done The Soft Bulletin, which came out in 1999, and we knew we that were gonna make another record before too long. But in between this, we were still in this mode of kind of just - not re-creating what we could be, but kind of doing different things. For the longest time in the Flaming Lips we were like, "Make a record, go on tour. Come back, make another record," and you know, I think, frankly, we were kind of like, "There's more to life than just recording records and going on tour."
I've never had a relationship with a record executive. I always went to the record company by someone that liked my playing. Then they would get fired, and I'd be left with the record company. And then - because they got fired - the record company wouldn't do anything for me.
People want to be the first with the record, they want to be the first to know which songs are on the record, all that kind of stuff. So I like to just stall them a bit. Personally, I love the idea of an album that's completely new, that no one's heard any free downloads, any pre-record releases, all that kind of stuff, and nothing's been played on the radio. Totally virgin, you know, a sealed record. That's my ideal, but it's very hard to get anybody else to agree to do that.
On every Bright Eyes record, there's some kind of sound collage that begins it. Some of them have dialogue, some don't. I like it because it can kind of slow down the attention span a bit. It's a way to draw you in to the rest of the record.
I haven't been walking around for years with some burning desire to do a solo record. If I had, maybe I'd have made a record that was experimental. Usually, the idea of a solo record is to get some weird stuff out of your system, but I don't think like that. I wasn't interested in making something that was a hard listen - maybe I'll get around to that some other time. I wanted it to sound effortless, not like I was trying to reinvent the wheel.
When I hear a great new record, especially when it's by someone that I respect and admire, then a part of me is like, Why didn't I think of that? Why didn't I write that record? It makes you sick, but in a way it can be a great thing. It makes you want to go back to the lab and start writing again. Maybe it will inspire you to try a little harder.
Well we usually just try to do a mix from all the albums so if somebody just has one they don't get bummed out that they don't hear anything from that record, then a couple songs you'll only hear live. Just kind of wing it you know? And sometimes on a tour you'll get with a set-list you like and you kind of just stick with that.
'Something/Anything?' was kind of a different record, since I'm playing everything myself. A lot of the songs on there have a particular kind of instrumentation that is much like a guitar quartet, and in some ways, it's an exceptional song on that record because so much of the writing on 'Something/Anything?' is piano-oriented.
Normally what I do is I'll record something that I really like which will be part of a song or an idea. I kind of just record things and then I'm done with them. It takes discipline to actually carve out a song.
I'm not thinking about the next record really yet. I kind of want to do a bunch of stuff with Jonathan Zawada, the guy who did the album art. I'd like to do some crazy art installations and design some weird synthesizers and work with other people and make some fun stuff for a bit. Maybe tap into virtual reality stuff or maybe write another record.
I certainly didn't predict people who spent years actively disliking the band to all of a sudden like the band. That's pretty funny to me, and it makes playing live kind of interesting, 'cos we're doing lots of things that don't really have a lot to do with that record, and even presenting the songs off that record in a way that's a little more muscular and without as much of the sheen, which is what I think part of what people really liked [about Kaputt].
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