Jens Lekman Quotes
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I became paranoid for a long time: I thought that people were out to harm me.
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Every wedding is slightly different from the other. But you always get to meet the funny uncle and the weirdo relatives, and there's always someone trying to beat you up for not playing enough Beatles songs or something.
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I need to write a sitcom, but something with warmth, not one where the dad comes home and he's treated like an idiot.
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I don't want music to be a museum.
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There's so much nostalgia for music from the past.
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When I was working on 'Night Falls Over Kortedala,' I was listening a lot to 'Graceland,' the Paul Simon record. I really got into the lyrics on that album. The opening line is so brilliant, the way he sets the scene.
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The 'sent' folder of my email program is really my biggest inspiration and my biggest source of lyrics. That's where I go to pick up a lot of the lyrics that I'm writing.
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I've never felt at home in Kortedala, or in Gothenburg, so I always felt like I needed to go somewhere and find some kind of perspective on things.
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I wouldn't write about something that I haven't experienced myself.
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I've established a certain voice over my albums. It can be an obstacle, but in the end, I think it's a strength, because I can build upon that voice, which is ultimately very much mine.
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I struggled with a lot of doubts around my songwriting and around what I was and what my purpose and mission were.
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The whole thing with playing on a stage with mics and all that has always been kind of uncomfortable to me.
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It was never part of how I imagined my music, and I watched in awe at how this ukulele troubadour image suddenly devoured the Jens Lekman I had planned so carefully.
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I don't like irony and sarcasm very much. But I do like it when you think someone is telling you a joke, and then you discover it's serious.
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I feel like the few times in my life when I really felt like I love my own story is when I've been the happiest.
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This is one of the reasons I'm so interested in stories. Because everyone has a story in their life, and when their story doesn't make sense, that's when we get depressed, I think.
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My aim is for every song to have a purpose - for you to be able to say, 'This song is about this.' But love and heartbreak are some of the most abstract subjects.
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In the past, I used to rely on the randomness of working with samples, which was a good way because it threw you in a completely different direction. You just thought, 'What if I take this samba drum and combined it with an '80s synth line or something from this record?'
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I went to Legoland in Denmark when I was five, I think, but I went to Germany when I was 17 to have a little adventure after graduation.
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It's weird talking about the album as a living being with its own thoughts and direction, especially if you're the one creating it.
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'Postcards' was just a way of slapping myself in the face and saying, 'You can do anything! Just go for it!'
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For me, it's sort of like a cultural democracy or musical socialism to take a stand and get out of the major cities if you can.
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I like short beards. Not a big fan of the bigger beards.
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When you're writing about difficult things and darker issues, it's nice to offer some sort of light at the end of the tunnel. Some sense of hope. Sometimes, the best way to do that is by offering it in the music, so that you can dance your way out of the darkness.