A Quote by Lenny Kravitz
Music, for me, is completely self-indulgent. I write it, I play the instruments, I arrange it, I produce it. It's all about me - as it should be.
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When I'm in the studio, I write the music, I play the different instruments, I produce it, I arrange it, and it's a self-indulgent exercise. It's the way I make my music. And when I'm acting, I get to leave myself behind, which is a relief. I get to collaborate with a director; I respect the director's medium and all the actors and actresses. So at the end of the day, it's about a character and it's about a director's vision. It's a really good balance for being so intense and alone in my personal process of making music.
I write songs, I play instruments, and I produce music that comes out for the world.
When I make music, I play it, I produce it, I write it. It's a very self-centered thing, not in a negative way. But I primarily work by myself, that's my process. When I'm acting, I'm there to serve the director and the character. I'm here to give you what you need. Communicate that to me and I will do what I need to do to get that. So that's what it's about.
I was sixteen, I became a working guitar player gigging in LA, mostly in top 40 bands, then touring. I learned to take songs apart, down to their bones. Songwriters would hire me to produce their demos, which lead me to become a songwriter. The relationship and power music has to TV and film attracted me to composing [and] I learned to write for instruments other than guitar.
That might be completely self-indulgent, to write your first major-label debut as a dedication to your family. But, you know, that's where my heart was.
Since my father is a musician as well, he taught me growing up that if you can play jazz, you can learn all instruments and write on them. He wanted me to be a songwriter that can do anything in any genre. I'm all about doing every genre.
But although I appreciate our audience, we don't do things for them. It's all for us - we play really self-indulgent music.
I found it easy to produce. I'm not the musical guy. I can't read and play music like that, but put some drums and a sample in front of me and I can whip it up nice, and I'll work out some keys and find some interesting instruments to put under it.
I bristle at the implication that only with the help of a Big Six editor does a novel lose its self-indulgent aspects. Before the advent of self-publishing, there were plenty of self-indulgent novels on the shelves.
My whole view of music completely flipped over on its head. I grew up listening to punk rock, SST. I liked people that were making music that weren't necessarily very good at their instruments, it was more about the ideas they had than how well they could play and sing.
I think theatre is a democratic act and I think writing a play is not a democratic act. I think we should give writers more leeway and space to write the thing they want to write, and then we should produce the play, multiple times, and let them re-write it.
My mom always told me I should have a Plan B. I said that if I'm not going to play guitar I'm going to play drums. And if I'm not going to play drums, I'm going to play bass. I always just wanted to play music. I was completely obsessed.
I go anywhere I want, do whatever I want when I get there, they let me make self-indulgent TV about that experience, and give me about as much creative freedom as anyone's ever had in the history of television.
I think I'm better at producing than I am at being a songwriter, but it doesn't change the fact that I still have a desire to play and write songs. I've never wanted to be a career musician. But I still love to play and write. It's a big part of who I am. Songwriting is not particularly easy for me. I think it would be easy for me if I didn't have such high restrictions and feelings about what I want my music to be. I'm not precious at all when it comes to producing music and I can bring that to an artist and let them expand their horizons.
I have a horror of being self-indulgent and wasting time, and there is that risk in doing this kind of work. Are you totally deluded in sitting down at a desk every day and trying to write something? Is it self-indulgent, or might it possibly lead to something worthwhile? At a certain point I decided to keep on because I felt like the work was getting better, and I was taking great pleasure in that.
I can be completely indulgent and spend as many hours and days or weeks as I like on one thing. Writing music and sitting in my studio, just pottering with ideas, it's a lot more personal and creative for me, I don't feel restricted.
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