A Quote by David Byrne
I still feel like if I can get a song to work with, say, a basic beat, a rhythm, some chord changes, and a melody, a vocal melody - if it works with that, then I feel it's written and there's something there. So I intentionally don't get involved with arranging stuff or fussing over the sounds and the edits and the beats too much, at least not in the beginning, because I feel like then you can fool yourself that you've got something there, when you might not.
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I still feel like if I can get a song to work with, say, a basic beat, a rhythm, some chord changes, and a melody, a vocal melody - if it works with that, then I feel it's written and there's something there.
I feel that as a writer and as a performer too. I never really thought about backstory for characters. It was much more of a musical approach: You learn a melody, and then you sing it, I suppose, or you find a rhythm or a cadence that works for the material. And then it's sort of about hitting that note correctly and finding those beats.
Everyone's [ me, Iain Cook and Martin Doherty] equally involved in all the writing. Normally we'll start with a sample or a drumbeat, or a synth sound or something like that, and that will spark the initial idea. And then we'll write an instrumental sketch of a song, and then we put on a nonsense vocal melody, which is always my favourite bit because it obviously sounds amazing.
Without you hearing a melody or music or anything like that, it would say something to you. So, that's what a song is to me. Now, you have a lot of songs that come out, and the beat carries them over there, because of the beat, and because of some other factors and so on and so forth. But I want mine to be a song, if you read it, it's going to mean something to you.
Lyrics are what I tend to tear hair out over and they're where I tend to feel weak musically, if I'm being very honest. It is not something I feel like I know anything about; I would not consider myself a writer. I just want to sing, I just want to sing a melody, I just want to feel a melody, and be part of the song, and everything else is not so important.
I don't like pre-written raps; I think it makes the song better if you listen to the beat first. In a sense, you have to make a marriage with the beat. I ride the beat, hear the flow of the drums, get the melody of my flow, and then from that point, it's a process of what I want to say.
I never feel like I'm in a rush. I'm controlling the pace. If I have the ball and hit the hole right now and get 3 yards, I feel like I can be patient, work for something, knowing I can still get the 3. It's something that's hard to be coached on. I just feel I've perfected it over time.
Each painting, I feel like I kind of might have gotten something. If I feel like I totally got it, there's probably something wrong and it's not finished. And if I really feel like I understand it then I'm done with these paintings and I'll have to do something else.
I turn on the machines and start to think about ideas and take it from there, it usually begins if it's a beat, a track creating a beat/beats and then the bass-line/lines, then comes the sounds--drones, atmospherics etc, then the edits of various sounds I created and keep going till I feel I have enough sounds ideas to start working and building a track. I have many banks of sounds that we hear that can be manipulated in the machines.
I feel like the world stopped. And I got off...and then it started spinning again, but too fast for me to hop back on. I feel like I'm still trying to get a...to get some kind of foothold on living
I like to get a vibe first, then a melody and really beat up the melody for a while, then try and find a lyric that really suits him/her.
I really like to absorb the project and watch it and work on the music a lot and just get the feel for it until eventually a moment comes where I know I've got it. A lot of it is trial and error. Some days a piece of music doesn't work then other day another piece of music finally says something and works with the picture and suddenly casts a light on all the other stuff you've done - probably because my mind is getting to understand it and the piece is educating me. I always feel like the score is in there already somewhere and I just have to channel it and accent it.
I usually know the general emotion of a song, or the general feeling of it, and then I think I just get so excited by the act of recording. I love that process so much that I feel like if I knew exactly what I wanted I'd arrive at something too soon. Part of the reason I work on stuff for so long is just because I love working on it. It's not that I'm haunted by some ghost sound. I just have nothing else to do with my life. Some people like to obsessively shop online. I like to obsessively rack up studio bills.
The music comes first, like, 99 percent of the time. I come up with the basic chord structure and the melody first and then I get really obsessed with arranging, adding, and subtracting parts. The last step of the process, for me, is finding words that fit into that structure and figuring out exactly what I want to talk about.
I'm not really sure why so much people still listen us. I think we live in an era when people get attached to stuff, and it means something. Then I think a lot of people heard about it over the years - like somebody's older brother might tell them, you know, because we're from his era, and he might be like, "You need to listen to this; this is what it's all about," you know what I mean? I don't know, man, it's hard to say. But it makes us feel special.
If you're not an actor, or if you're any other kind of artist, there's this sense that, "I must express this thing." Why make a painting if you don't feel like you have to for something inside of yourself? Why make a song if you don't feel like you have to because there's something that you need to get out? And when you're an actor and you're not performing text that you've written, I think there's this bizarre disconnect with the must-ness of it.
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