I thought that it would be interesting to have a mirror and grab a light and shine it around in different ways. It's an analog to the acoustic reflections that we're going to be trying to activate as well.
I try to influence this improvisation in two ways. One is by centering on reflections, in both senses of the word: acoustic reflections as well as visual reflections from a mirror or surface, and then reflecting on the material in a contemplative way. The other influence is listening to the tails of the sounds that you make.
If you've got 15 actors on stage who are all trying to shine a light on themselves, they are all trying to outshine each other. Whereas if you have 14 of those actors trying to shine a light on one person, and each of them is trying to make the other look good, you have a much more interesting process.
I'm here to challenge myself and to see whether I can shape-shift in an environment that's actually quite daunting, but which I think would be nice to shine a light into. The destination of any interesting drama is that you shine a light into a place that not many people know about.
'Brace the Wave' is an acoustic-electric record recorded with electricity on analog-digital and digitally-analog equipment.
If you're trying to diet, what do you do? You grab your two friends and say, 'We're going to the gym; let's do this together.' Money shouldn't be any different. If you're trying to make progress, if you're trying to save more, we really need to be able to get support.
I never thought I would do an all-acoustic tour or an all-acoustic album.
I didn't see myself any different from my white counterparts in school. I just didn't! I thought I could do what they did. And what I didn't do well, I thought people were going to give me the opportunity to do well, because maybe they saw my talent, so they would give me a chance. I had no idea that they would see me completely different.
I think we get on with living our lives like everybody else does. Where we're at in music is trying to explain what's going around us either directly or by analogy and trying to create a parallel, an analog, sometimes musical, sometimes dramatic, that might be truthful.
I have about four different endeavors I'm going after right now. They all excite me in different ways. I'm all about keeping as many irons in the fire as possible. I'm writing music, trying to write a book (aren't we all?), putting a festival together, speaking... It keeps life interesting.
Angels are intelligent reflections of light, that original light which has no beginning. They can illuminate. They do not need tongues or ears, for they can communicate without speech, in thought.
Growing up, I realized as an actor I had to figure out how to use my platform in order to give back as well and use that spotlight to shine, or at least to balance that light and to try to shine light onto the other issues that were happening in the world.
I was one of those kids who kept trying on different skins in high school. I was very afraid to be myself around all of these kids, to really reveal any part of myself that was true, so I would try on different skins, try on different masks, hoping I'd hit on one that was cool or quirky or interesting enough that suddenly I would be OK.
You are not the one who experiences liberation; you are the clearing, the opening, the emptiness, in which any experience comes and goes, like reflections on the mirror. And you are the mirror, the mirror mind, and not any experienced reflection.
I thought a circus environment would be an interesting venue to explore, where you didn't just have one tent with three rings and a show going on but where you could explore different things in different tents.
I sit around and play acoustic guitar - usually acoustic, sometimes electric, occasionally piano, but more often guitar, just trying to come up with tunes. Ideas kind of pop into your head.
I like to work with a combination of analog and Pro Tools. I love the sound of analog tape, but there's so many things you can do with Pro Tools that would be incredibly difficult and very time-consuming with analog.