A Quote by DJ Shadow

Frequently, when I'm compared to someone, I'm like, "Is that really what people think I sound like?" — © DJ Shadow
Frequently, when I'm compared to someone, I'm like, "Is that really what people think I sound like?"

Quote Author

DJ Shadow
Born: June 29, 1972
I definitely prefer things to be dark, I definitely prefer things to not be particularly obvious. I like a lot of mystery in music, and I like it when things don't sound just like what they sound like always. But at the same time I like everything to sound very earnest and honest. So I don't really think that I have a definite stamp, but if people see that, that's awesome.
You see people you identify with, and you take pieces of people you like and shape who you are. Like, I sound just like my dad. But that's literally my vocal chords. I can't sound like anything else... I sound like him, but I act like myself.
I don't really think there's a genre that we couldn't do, but it wouldn't sound like that genre, if that makes sense. I think we could take any song, but it would sound like us. If you're doing a country song, it could maybe sound a little bit country, but it's going to sound like Pentatonix.
I'm not sure I'm going to be that type of artist but I do love cultural icons. Like Solange has been really great at that. Releasing her album end of last year and being really strong in their sound, bands like Little Dragon, artists like James Blake. You know their music when you hear them. They have a really particular sound and it's really cultural and people copy that sound. You hear it in other songs and you're like 'That's a James Blake tune'.
Part of the success of This American Life, I think, is due to the fact that none of us sound like we should be on the radio. We don't sound professional; we sound like people you would know.
Going to a grammar school, you mixed with all sorts of different types and I used to listen to how they talked. When I did my imitations, I could sound like someone really rough, or I could sound like a cabinet minister.
When we sit in meditation and hear a sound, we think, 'Oh, that sound's bothering me.' If we see it like this, we suffer. But if we investigate a little deeper, we see that the sound is simply sound. If we understand like this, then there's nothing more to it. We leave it be. The sound is just sound, why should you go and grab it? You see that actually it was you who went out and disturbed the sound.
When I go to the cinema, I want to have a cinematic experience. Some people ignore the sound and you end up seeing something you might see on television and it doesn't explore the form. Sound is the other picture. When you show people a rough cut without the sound mix they are often really surprised. Sound creates a completely new world. With dialogue, people say a lot of things they don't mean. I like dialogue when it's used in a way when the body language says the complete opposite. But I love great dialogue I think expositional dialogue is quite crass and not like real life.
It doesn't really matter what someone's hair looks like or if the sound is perfect. Every director who's made a couple of movies knows that, because you can replace the sound. Or, like, any one shot is not that important, because they all add up together.
Honestly, I personally would prefer to have my name not mentioned alongside codifiers, like 'white rapper' or things like that, because the codifiers I like are Texas rappers. If you were to compare me to Lil' Keke or the people that really inspired me, like UGK... In my mind, that's who I think I should be compared to.
That's the thing I like about my sound. It's real raw and very unsafe compared to a solid state kind of sound.
Irish is harder to pull off. I know southern people and I really like the midwest, so I can tap into that a little bit. It's easier to sound angry with southern than it is Irish. Yelling Irish you can sound like an angry Leprechaun. I think me screaming like I am going to kill you in Irish doesn't work.
Even during the promotion I told people that I didn't like Rush Hour. The jokes I didn't understand and the fighting, compared to my Hong Kong films was terrible. A lot of people didn't like it. But mostly people did like it, they really liked it. Rush Hour really brought me to the American family audience.
I do get credit for having a California sound to my music, but I don't think people really know what that means - they think the Beach Boys. I'm thinking more like Sunset Strip in the 1960s and stuff like that.
That sounds so weird: "kill yourself." It makes it sound like you tried to murder someone, only that someone is you. But killing someone is wrong, and I don't think suicide is. It's my life, right? I should be able to end it if I want to. I don't think it's a sin.
I like to think of myself as an original. I have my own sound. That's not easy to come by, I worked on it for many years. But I like to think that I sound like Dewey Redman
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