Brian Eno Quotes

When I first started making ambient music, I was setting up systems using synthesizers that generated pulses more or less randomly. The end result is a kind of music that continuously changes. Of course, until computers came along, all I could actually present of that work was a piece of its output.

Brian Eno Roxy Music

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Quotes to Explore

• It infuriates me that stuff from the Internet routinely doesn't include all the credits. Because as soon as I listen to something, if I like it, I want to know, "Who's the bass player?" "Who did that?" "Who's the engineer on this?

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Internet
  • Bass Player
  • Credits

• I think very often producers are really trying to repeat things. When they hear something in the new songs that they recognize as being a bit like something that was a success on a previous record, they're inclined to encourage that.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • I Think
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• When I've finally got the title, I think, "Okay, yes, now I know where we are. Now I know what it is. Fine, that must be finished or nearly finished.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • I Know
  • Finished
  • Title

• The big message of gospel is that you don't have to keep fighting the universe; you can stop, and the universe is quite good to you. There is a loss of ego.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Good
  • Stop
  • Universe

• It's amazing how quickly people get used to bad quality.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • People
  • Amazing
  • Quality

• Most people have no idea what something would sound like if it wasn't an MP3.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • People

• My kind of composing is more like the work of a gardener. The gardener takes his seeds and scatters them, knowing what he is planting but not quite what will grow where and when - and he won't necessarily be able to reproduce it again afterwards either.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Work

• I think everyone's inherently snobbish. Things that are very popular are not taken seriously, because the snobbish side of one says, 'Well, if everyone likes it it can't be that good.' Whereas if only I and a couple of other people like it, then it must be really something special.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • People
  • Good
  • Taken

• Everybody is entertained to death.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Death

• Feelings are more dangerous than ideas, because they aren't susceptible to rational evaluation. They grow quietly, spreading underground, and erupt suddenly, all over the place.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music

• Of course, like anybody I repeat myself endlessly, but I don't know that I'm doing it, usually.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music

• People assume that the meaning of a song is vested in the lyrics. To me, that has never been the case. There are very few songs that I can think of where I remember the words.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • People
  • Remember
  • Song

• I hate the rock music tradition. I can't bear it!

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Music
  • Hate
  • Rock

• Law is always better than war.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • War
  • Law

• If I tried to make a commercial album, it would be a complete flop. I have no idea what the world at large likes.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • World

• A big ego means that you have some confidence in your abilities, really, and that you're prepared to take the risk of trying them out.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Trying
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• I'd been making music that was intended to be like painting, in the sense that it's environmental, without the customary narrative and episodic quality that music normally has. I called this 'ambient music.' But at the same time I was trying to make visual art become more like music, in that it changed the way that music changes.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Time
  • Music
  • Trying

• Agressive music can only shock you once. Afterwards its impact declines. It's inevitable.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Music

• Zappa was very technical and impressed by things that were musically challenging - weird time signatures, strange keys, awkward chord sequences. Zappa was important to me as an example of everything I didn't want to do. I'm very grateful to him, actually.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Time
  • Important
  • Weird

• For me it's always contingent on getting a sound-the sound always suggests what kind of melody it should be. So it's always sound first and then the line afterwards.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music

• One of the things you're doing when you make art, apart from entertaining yourself and other people, is trying to see what ways of working feel good, what feels right.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • People
  • Good
  • Trying

• When I finish something, I want it out that day. Pop music is like the daily paper. Its got to be there then, not six months later.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Music
  • Daily

• The smart thing in the art world is to have one good idea and never have another.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • World
  • Good
  • Art

• The whole history of pop music had rested on the first person singular, with occasional intrusions of the second person singular.

  

  Brian Eno Roxy Music
  • Music
  • History