Antony and the Johnsons Quotes
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My creative process isn't a long one, so I could have started a song 10 years ago and then finish it 10 years later. It's all just about pushing around words and melodies, for me. The material is kind of shape-shifting.
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I am transgender, so 'he' is not appropriate and 'she' is problematic. I haven't been one to wage war with society to force people to address me a certain way. I let people make that decision for themselves. I don't identify as a man, so 'he' is silly in a way. Being called 'she' as a trans person, trans in the sense that I'm trans, is to be honoured in an aspect of yourself.
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I feel as though I can get an end result that works for me, but as far as recording techniques, I don't feel that confident in my abilities.
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I'm really not working in a environment that's sonically pristine. It's not a conventional studio, obviously; it's a bit ramshackle.
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When I was a junior in college I moved to New York and went to this performance school the Experimental Theatre Wing. We had singing class and again, some of the other students would cry when I was singing, and I really didn't know why. I started to realize that there was something in the tone of my voice that was evocative for them.
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It's just a spare room in my apartment. It's very cluttered and not particularly aesthetically inspiring, and it's very un-noise-proof.
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I think what holds people up in creative processes is the expectation of what it is they're doing. It's also the sense of judgement, you know, people editing themselves.
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I enjoy touring and traveling because that's the time when I get to read, and listen to music. You have all that downtime, which is great for that.
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I see everything as creative material. If I pick up a shell of a song that I wrote 10 years ago, all that matters is the reality of that material as it's living today.
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I feel very grateful that for some reason I was raised to believe that I had permission to explore the creative world. I'm very aware of what a privilege that is, because most people don't grant themselves that permission, and I really think that's the only thing that separates people that call themselves artists from the rest of the world. It's suspending self-judgment for long enough to do something expressive.
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Every interview is as much an impression of the journalist as it is the artist or subject. You look at interviews and you see a portrait of two people. The worst thing that can happen is if you're misquoted and then that quote is misquoted. That does drive one crazy. The most embarrassing thing is when your words are misrepresented or sometimes you say something stupid and you live to regret it.
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I can really only can record at home.
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I think, with music in general, people just inevitably connect with feeling. The opportunity to hear expressed feeling. And that's what has always drawn me towards music. It's something where, by connecting to someone else's voice, I feel less lonely. I feel more alive. I feel more connected to the world and to the rest of humanity. Sometimes a voice can be like a lifeline.
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Sometimes when I'm traveling, I feel a little bit dislocated, especially the transitions you make when you're traveling - you go to a different city every day.
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I find when I'm touring or when I'm traveling, I just enter this other world kind of. It's much easier for me to be creative and be unselfconscious about creating when I'm home.
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Every year I used to write a musical inspired by John Waters, and I would get all my friends together and put on this perverse, emotional, tragic musical.
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What separates people that create from the people that don't is just one's ability to take action despite the fear, you know? Or to suspend the fear, or more commonly, the voice of judgment within yourself that says, "This isn't good enough. You don't deserve to do this. You're not worthy. Your expression isn't meaningful. You have nothing to contribute, just get back to your 9-to-5 job." It's not so much that I don't have all those same voices, it's more just that for some reason as a kid I was shameless enough that could plow through them for long enough to get something on the table.
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I just feel like [creativity] is a reflection of the world around me and I don't think you can divorce yourself from that. So I don't really think in terms of, 'Do you still have it?' Even if I was doing something new, I think I would be engaged in the same process.
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I find that I'm always struggling with the noise of the city. When I get a good take, there will be a horn or a siren or something. So it makes me very conscious of outside sounds, which in a way maybe led me to incorporate the field recordings.
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I went to New York to be where the beautiful people were and it didn't disappoint me. It's so open. It's a great platform to do your own thing or start new things. When I got there, I started living for the first time.
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I have totally like an urbanite relationship to nature. I mean I'm not someone who hikes.
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I don't really understand the natural world, I admire it and am a little bit afraid of its power.
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No matter how public your work is, it's just a relationship with yourself. And you have to create a little sacred space inside yourself to treasure that... because when you die, that's still what you have. It's what you're born with and what you leave with. It's kind of a story of the way you accompanied yourself through your life.
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There are so many more productive things to do than sit around feeling shame and guilt. Beyond touching on shame and guilt in a perfunctory manner, I wouldn't bother with that at all.