John Darnielle Quotes
Your creativity before it gets formed into words and songs is the actual substance. No one else can see it, right? Unless you give it the shape of a song or a painting or whatever.

Quotes to Explore
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I close my eyes when I sing so I can feel the song better.
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If I were dying, my last words would be: Have faith and pursue the unknown end.
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You can't try and make something you think someone else will like. You can only make what you like. How can you make a song that Yo-Landi Visser likes? You don't know me. You'll never understand me.
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I'm interested in doing everything and anything that I can to squeeze that creativity out of my brain. I guess I'm sort of a performance rat.
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I'm terrified of therapy because I don't want it to mess with my creativity.
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What offends me the most when I hear criticisms about this so-called Africa bias is how quick we are to focus on the words and propaganda of a few powerful, influential individuals, and to forget about the millions of anonymous people who suffer from their crimes.
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With songs I almost see the images, see the action, and then all I have to do is describe it. It's almost like watching a scene from a film, and that's what I go about trying to catch in a song.
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Life is painting a picture, not doing a sum.
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I really like Ariana Grande, Jessie J, and Nicki Minaj's song, the 'Bang Bang' song. It's the new 'Lady Marmalade.' So good.
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It is convenient to distinguish the two kinds of experience which have thus been described, the experienc-ing and the experienc-ed, by technical words.
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The one I tell everyone, the one I'm very, very proud of is 'Call Me Irresponsible.' Simply because I want to say and it's not as facetious as it sounds. It has five syllable words in it.
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Art, whatever form it takes, requires hard work, craftsmanship and creativity. As a writer, I know my grammar, cadence, the music of prose, and the art of the narrative.
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But I now entered on my fifteenth year - a sad epoch in the life of a slave girl. My master began to whisper foul words in my ear. Young as I was, I could not remain ignorant of their import.
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Leadership is practiced not so much in words as in attitude and in actions.
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My painting does not come from the easel.
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There's a lot of craft that goes into achieving a hit song - at the beginning of your career, you're usually more inspiration than craft, and you get great when those intersect. A skilled songwriter can get you to that intersection.
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Both my grandmothers had upright pianos, and I just knew how to play since I was a child. Nobody taught me. I sounded like a grown-up, and then I learned how to read music. I played so well by ear I could fool the teacher to believe I could play the notes. She'd make the mistake of playing the song once, and I could play it.
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What you hear about the band is always going to be more disturbing than any particular song.
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My music is more than me writing a flashy soul song. They're heartfelt songs about my family and true stories. I have also songs that aren't personal, but just painting a picture. I don't like being put under labels, but my music is going to continue to stay classic and timeless forever.
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Lebanon is a Syrian protectorate. The Lebanese dare not do anything without the approval of Damascus.
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Acting is easier and smoother than singing - it's less drama.
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Mr. Washington apologizes for injustice, he belittles the emasculating effects of caste distinctions, and opposes the higher training and ambitions of our brighter minds. The way for people to gain their reasonable rights is not by voluntarily throwing them away.
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Her absence is like the sky, spread over everything. But no, that is not quite accurate. There is one place where her absence comes locally home to me, and it is a place I can't avoid. I mean my own body. It had such a different importance while it was the body of H.'s lover. Now it's like an empty house.
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Your creativity before it gets formed into words and songs is the actual substance. No one else can see it, right? Unless you give it the shape of a song or a painting or whatever.