Pessimism and optimism are slammed up against each other in my records, the tension between them is where it’s all at, it’s what lights the fire.
I would love to sell millions of records, but that’s never gonna be the case.
My earliest memories as a child are listening to Beatles records, and they are a big part of how I’ve learned to write pop songs.
Food fighters in Japan think of themselves as athletes. They have a higher recognition of the game and are constantly thinking about records. I probably won’t continue for long because it puts pressure on the body. But I am at the age where I can perform my best.
When I first heard Ray Charles, he was a flop artist on a small label in California. He hadn’t sold any records. And I bought his contract for $2,500.
Shakespeare did not consider himself the legislator of mankind. He faithfully records man’s problems and does not evidently propose to solve them.
If one of us, any of us, any American is traveling in a town somewhere in America and a medical crisis hits them, for someone who is diabetic or perhaps has heart disease or some other problems, where do we get the records to determine what to do?
As I speak to you today, government censors somewhere are working furiously to erase my words from the records of history. But history itself has already condemned these tactics.
I did write more mainstream stuff with DK. But you could always tell the records that I wrote in contrast with everybody else’s because the format was a bit different. The harmonies were used in a different type of way. Way more metaphors in the mix.
When some guy shows up with a shopping bag full of records and CD’s and wants me to sign every one plus fifteen pieces of blank paper I wonder what the hell is he doing with all of that?
It became a question of do I want to be on a label where it could take three years to put out a record instead of putting out three records over the same period of time on my own.
I’m a collecting maniac and I buy a lot of books and records. I have over thousand cds.
As a band, we always took a really long time to make records, so unfortunately, we got into that habit of, like, ‘We’ll work on it tomorrow.’
Today, people are more into the glitz and the glamour of everything. We don’t even read the inside of records anymore.
I remember I heard it in an interview with Michael Jackson one day, saying the art is gone, everybody makes records just to make a record. See, I always want the artist that try to build a whole body of music on one album, so you can enjoy it. So you could say, ‘I went with him here, I went with him here.’
There’s a lot of people over time who have brought out all these funky records that everybody has started jumping on like a catch phrase… When Planet Rock came out, then you had all of the electro funk records.
The alternate media are becoming important and viable alternatives to playing live. Records, videos, that kind of thing. They’re going to start to count for something. Because there’s only a limited amount of us-time available to us.
I like to make records sound good. I’m more like a reducer than a producer. If an artist cannot produce themselves, what’s the point?
When Elvis was performing, you just tried to figure out a way to get there. I think he set all the records and anyone that has ever had the good fortune to see him, you know what it’s like to try to get in to see Elvis. It was impossible, practically.
All record companies want big-selling records, and my music is a little too raw for commercial success.
Dalton’s records, carefully preserved for a century, were destroyed during the World War II bombing of Manchester. It is not only the living who are killed in war.
All records are riddles, and whatever you may want people to think it’s about, it may just be throwing them off. And you don’t want it to get in the way of what someone else’s understanding is. It’s not really about anything. At the same time, it will find some meaning.
I’d always wanted to work in the studio and experiment with sounds. Things that I’m really influenced by and that I love are like The Beatles and Radiohead, and all those records by bands whose music is really involved.
Creatively, I thought we were still viable and could do more records. But our working relationship just wasn’t happening at all, and our chemistry as people broke down because of that.
I remember the first time I dropped a couple of house records, someone threw an Air Force One in my face.
I am not a piece of hash. I’m in charge of Factory Records. I think.
My girlfriend is rap. Music and albums and records and my kids.
I love it when people say things to me in public and want to meet me, because I want to meet them! Early on, my manager told me, ‘If you want to sell 500,000 records, then go out there and meet 500,000 people.’
I produce the records. I don’t hand over control to some really expensive producer who then talks to the record company and then tries to bend me to their will – for commercial purposes.
Before I was 5, I did have a lot of time on my hands. I had no job and really no career, and I spent an awful lot of time listening to records. It was more the classical ones, really – Prokofiev, and I think there was some Mozart in there, and more impressionistic composers like Delius.
The only album that I listen to upon recording a new one is my ‘Cry’ album, because sonically, I think it’s my best album to date. But other than that, I’ve never listened to my records, ever.
Geddy Lee and I went to the same grade school. He moved away when we were still young, but I remember him like I do all my friends from back then. Then in 1982, Dave Thomas and I were approached to do a record as the McKenzie Brothers on Anthem Records, the same label that Rush was on.
To me, making records isn’t work.
Harout Pamboukjian is one of the biggest Armenian folk singers in the world. In the ’70s, he was making these records that were really Zeppelin-influenced.
It’s about giving the people what they want. So many people have told me that they’ve made love to my records so what I’ve delivered this time is an album about sex. Pretty much every song has that theme. Straight no chasers, it’s booty music!
I’ve made my records and I’ve done all the interviews. I’ve done lots of long tours. I’ve made stupid videos. I’ve done all that stuff and learned all the lingo and gone to radio stations and shmoozed with DJs on the air and met retail people.
I need to let people know who I am and instead of just trying to make great records, just be honest and make it more personal and make it more passionate, to make records with emotion and not be afraid to express that.
So why sign your name in blood for more? It seemed like a sensible arrangement for me. I didn’t sell large numbers of records and the record company paid advances they rarely recouped.
But I’m after medals more than anything. Championships don’t get taken away from you but records do, so I think I’d rather have medals at every championships rather than times. A world record would be a bonus, but I’m still only 25 in 17 days.
I would like to promote the concept of a partnership of insurance companies, physicians and hospitals in deploying a basic framework for an electronic medical records system that is affordable.
I’d rather sell 10,000 records that represent me than 2 million that don’t represent me at all.
Who you are as a performer is one thing, but when you’re making records, you’re dealing with musicians’ tastes, their goals, their wants, their needs, everyone’s individual pride.
The records that I like, they have life and warmth and soul in them. Like the slap back on Scotty Moore’s guitar on ‘Mystery Train.’ You’re not gonna get that in a computer. You’re gonna want a live room, you’re gonna wanna bounce the tape, you’re gonna want real musicians, in a room, vibin’ off of each other.
I don’t relate to what’s left of the music business. There doesn’t seem to be any point to it anymore. The business that I grew up in and loved, we made records a different way – there were record companies, there were stores where you could buy albums.
We certainly strive for trying to make a quality record throughout, and I think that’s true of all of our records.
Will they attack us? Yes. Will they smear our backgrounds and distort our records? Undoubtedly. Will they lie about us, harass our families, namecall to try to intimidate us? They will. There’s nothing safe about it. But is it worth it? Well, let me ask you. Is freedom worth it? Is America worth it?
I like doing things in a very minimal, unconventional way as a personal way of saying, ‘Look, I made a career out of carefully and craftfully, though unconventionally, making records on laptops and blown speakers.’
At an early age I was listening to BB King, what have you. Ray Charles, Jimmy Smith, Jimmy Mcgriff, you dig? With the obvious Marvin Gayes and the Motown records.
I wasn’t the kind of person that liked waiting for autographs or following them, I just liked to go to the shows, study their records, driving many, many hours to different states to go to concerts.
To be honest, producing records interests me less at the moment and I really don’t want to get involved in album projects that are going to take up a lot of time.
I’m trying to make pop records for the middle-class, lower-middle-class – pop for the 99 percent.
