You live in a bubble, generally, when you're touring and recording - you're in confined - in alone space, wherever you are, in the dressing room or in the studio - so sometimes it's hard to grasp that bigger picture of things that are going on.
Everything has changed since I started recording in 1972. But the very things that have opened this industry, like the digital platforms to reach more people, have also killed things that were happening before in the recording studio. Now, most of the time, there are no real musicians in the studio; it's people with sequencers and things.
I mean, even my dressing room at the studio has candles and cushions and cashmere rugs and things.
If you want a measure of how private a place the dressing room was when I was growing up at Manchester United, consider this: even Sir Alex Ferguson would knock before coming into the dressing room at the Cliff, the old training ground. The dressing room is for the players - and the players only.
Don't you know that there's another bubble as well An expectations bubble. Bigger houses private planes yachts ...... stupid salaries and bonuses. People come to desire these things and expect them. But the expectations bubble will burst as well as all bubbles do. Come to my gallery and I will sell you beautiful things at a more reasonable price. But the point is that they will have value. Things of real beauty things of the spirit.
Wherever I am on location, I can usually, even in the weirdest little places, find a recording studio.
And sometimes, I'd be allowed to be hanging out in the studio, which I just loved kind of, like, being in the room with these big recording desks, with all these, like, buttons and knobs and watching the guys use them.
More live recording. I have missed the boat over my career by not doing every second or third CD live because things happen onstage that don't happen in the studio.
Playing live was always definitely a lot more fun. You picture it: working alone in the studio eight or 10 hours a day with nobody else there, being frustrated and driven crazy by all of the things that you have to deal with, vs. thousands of people screaming and singing along with you playing.
Sometimes the picture is more interesting than what is going on. Sometimes the picture is suggestive of greater things in society or the history of what might be connected to the theme in the pictures and those are worth exploring.
Things don't get tough in the studio. Sometimes things get tough outside the studio and going in the studio is a relief, a sanctuary, therapy.
I'm never tired of going to the studio. I enjoy recording and documenting everything and trying new things.
I'm extremely introverted. I used to think it was shyness, but I got over that, so it must be door No. 2. It's still hard for me to be away from home much, and I have to make sure I get lots of time alone in my room when I'm touring.
I finished touring the last record and I started recording new .I never really left the bubble, which is I think a good thing. I was just very focused. Maybe I should have taken a break or something, and not done such a long push.
Every musician knows your studio is like - it's a bubble for you. It's a personal space. This is where I work, where I create.
I think it's important to look at the world as a bigger place than just the bubble that we live in. It's so easy to get caught up in things of a trivial nature.
The first rap I recorded was on Jeezy's 'White Girl' beat. One of my partners invited me to his studio, so I go. I wasn't planning on recording, we were just messing around. And I started recording a song, just a freestyle. Back then, Jeezy was going so hard, that's what everyone was on. That's what me and my partners in the trap would listen to.