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All the folks I play with come from jazz backgrounds or at least appreciate spontaneity within the parameters of a pop song.
Andrew Bird -
What's cool about indie rock is that one band can do effectively the same thing as another band, and one band nails it, and the other one doesn't. I like that elusiveness.
Andrew Bird
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In school I was painfully shy. But as soon as I had to get up in front of the class and give a book report, it was alarming - I'd suddenly be very articulate.
Andrew Bird -
I don't want technology to take me so far that I don't have to use my brain anymore. It's like GPS taking over and losing your internal compass. It's always got to be tactile, still organic.
Andrew Bird -
I still kind of believe this absurd line that if you have to write it down, it's not worth remembering.
Andrew Bird -
I think when I was pretty young I got really into the tone of my instrument and I remember just playing one note for an hour to just kind of feel the resonance of the violin.
Andrew Bird -
Music as a social conduit has always been important to me.
Andrew Bird -
My favorite literature to read is fairly dry history. I like the framework, and my imagination can do the rest.
Andrew Bird
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There's a lot of interesting words, nomenclatures, in science.
Andrew Bird -
Since I first picked up the violin, I've been very interested in tone and texture: I would have very visceral reactions to the texture of a snare drum or a pedal steel guitar or a violin.
Andrew Bird -
I think I'm still a little too intense for my own good sometimes.
Andrew Bird -
I've done my share of busking, and it's fun until it isn't. There are musicians in the subways that will make you cry, they're so good.
Andrew Bird -
I create little challenges for myself, like, 'Okay, whatever you do in this song, you've got to somehow work in Greek Cypriots,' or something like that.
Andrew Bird -
I spend a lot of time working by myself developing songs, but I really need some other counterpart to help me pull it all together, because you go nuts working if I had to finish an entire project all within my own head.
Andrew Bird
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What you see with your eyes when you're making music is going to have a profound effect on what you hear.
Andrew Bird -
I am, in some sense, a writer. Even though I kinda downplay the word thing, I do enjoy writing sometimes.
Andrew Bird -
Every time I get up in the morning, melodies occur to me and I start trying to shape lyrics to melodies.
Andrew Bird -
I don't write poetry and then strum some chords and then fit the words on top of the chords.
Andrew Bird -
A day off after a show with no agenda in a foreign city is about the most fertile creative situation I can imagine. Just walking with nothing to do, killing time and hearing the sights and sounds of an unfamiliar place.
Andrew Bird -
The problem is, when you're working with orchestras, you only get the orchestra for about two hours before the performance to pull it all together, and that doesn't sound like a real collaboration.
Andrew Bird
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I write a lot more when I'm happy, because you're hopeful, you're motivated.
Andrew Bird -
I guess I'm attracted to more archaic words because they can be imbued with more meaning, because their definition is elusive.
Andrew Bird -
Melodies are just honest. They can only be what they are. Words have the capacity for deception. They're all full of subtext, and some of them are cliche and overused and vernacular. They're tricky. All I can say is, words are tricky.
Andrew Bird -
Guitars are kind of just, you know, sexy, especially old vintage ones.
Andrew Bird