-
The way Jacques Brel writes a story, getting into the character, bringing out all his faults and qualities in the same song.... Not that I could ever write in such an epic way, but it really is a different way to go about writing lyrics...and I find that quite inspiring.
Zach Condon -
I think that within the world of music that we work in, which is so not perfect, I think that you really do have to learn to accept your own mistakes as part of the beauty of music itself.
Zach Condon
-
The more I know, the more I realise I don't know. And the more I realise I'll never truly understand.
Zach Condon -
I just reached the point where I realised, I need to stop repeating myself if I'm ever actually going to enjoy the music I'm creating.
Zach Condon -
I like to think that location, travel, etc, is a launching point for purely imagining.
Zach Condon -
I tend to hear rhythm and melody, chord-progressions, long before I hear words.
Zach Condon -
I think that sonically, music speaks volumes more than words do, and I have always thought that and will continue to think that for the rest of my life.
Zach Condon -
I felt like I needed to get a few side projects out of my system before I settled in to do the new record. Usually what's asked of you, everything's a year cycle. When you get caught up in that cycle, it can be kind of brutal, actually. It was good I got to take a year off, with no pressure coming from anywhere.
Zach Condon
-
I think, if I had my choice, I would spend all my time in the studio writing, and creating music.
Zach Condon -
As much as I try to grow as a lyricist, I tend to laugh at even calling myself that, because I think that my actual talents lie more in arrangements than they do words.
Zach Condon -
I'm sure that's every adolescent's complaint about their home town. When a city is unstimulating, you get pretty isolated.
Zach Condon -
In some ways, I feel like I've been such a dilettante for so many years, just picking up instruments and stretching myself so thin.
Zach Condon -
I released that side of things really as kind of an introduction to where I came from musically, back in the day when all I had was a keyboard, a drum machine, and a four-track. So I was doing these little synth-pop ditties, and it's how I learned to write.
Zach Condon -
There is a beauty to touring - to be honest, there's a way that music connects and you really feel the actual reaction of people to the music that you're making, and I feel like if I didn't do that I just wouldn't know, and I don't think my music would be the same.
Zach Condon
-
I have tried to write soundtracks, and the main problem with those was that the directors often had in their minds a much stronger sense of what they wanted to hear, than what I was willing to give them, and I guess there was no way to say, "Well why don't you write your scene around my music?" Because that's just cocky and awful.
Zach Condon -
You always know when a real inspiration is behind the melody, arrangements, even lyrics. And I know that's really vague, but it's true.
Zach Condon -
My thought with harmonies and melodies in general, is that if it doesn't come right away then it's never going to come at all.
Zach Condon -
Often when I find myself listening to music, at least 60 to 70% of it is foreign, so I don't understand a word of it. Melody to me will always be a million times more important than words.
Zach Condon -
I can't work in Brooklyn. Unless I'm completely locked away in a studio, there's just too much distraction and stimulation.
Zach Condon -
It's a natural tendency of mine to not even listen to lyrics.
Zach Condon
-
I think that there's a proliferation of music that is done entirely in the bedroom for an Internet audience, but there's no way in hell that you could actually kill off a live show, and its importance in the creation of music - it's just impossible.
Zach Condon -
I write one step at a time, always finishing off the part I'm working on before even thinking about the next part. I need to hear it all together before deciding what goes next. I even mix before moving on...in other words, I write by recording.
Zach Condon -
As a teenager and a young adult, I never felt like my own story was interesting enough to tell, so I always wrote lyrics from someone else's perspective - told someone else's story.
Zach Condon -
There was always a unique Beirut sound, it was always there, and so this time I just dove straight into that, instead of daydreaming and wandering.
Zach Condon