Brinsley Schwarz Quotes
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I'm an extremely slow worker, very unprolific. It can take me weeks to do a three-minute song, or at least to make it sound, in my mind, like I haven't written it. That's when I'm satisfied.
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A devastating culmination of the elegant and the funky, a really sensational musician with enormous depth.
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Even if I was really prolific - which I'm not - I think I'd always put at least a couple of covers on my record. I think it's a sort of healthy thing to do. It shows that you're not totally self-obsessed.
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I loved Christmas. We had a really great time. But there wasn't - it was all - you had to be happy with, you know, an orange and a couple of walnuts, you know, in your stocking.
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And the other thing for the sort of posher kids was a sort of lethal scooter, you know. One of the things that you just push along with your - really heavy, lethal, you know, trap your fingers in and every bit of metal got rusty very quickly. And the girls I seem to remember they had a thing like a broomstick with a horse's head on the top which they sat astride.
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The idea was put to me, and my initial reaction was of slight sort of - I was slightly appalled, really, because in the U.K., we don't - we think it's all a bit vulgar, you know, doing Christmas or cashing in on Christmas. And there's a word we have for it, which is naff. And it's not exactly uncool. It really sort of means kind of vulgar and a bit - not very stylish.
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I'm very fussy about how my records sound, but I'm very aware that because of the way they sound, I will never be a big-selling, mainstream artist because the public has gotten conditioned to hearing pop music in a certain way. And I don't do it that way.
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I realized sometime in the early '80s that if I didn't do something - like planning for the future in a way, a kind of pension or something - that if I didn't do something there and then, I was going to be condemned to forever present my three years as a pop star, condensed, as a stage act for the rest of my life. Because that's normally what happens to people in the pop business.
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Rather the pain of discipline than the pain of regret.
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I sort of have various sort of theories when people ask me about songwriting because it is a mystery. You don't really know. Sometimes you can do it and sometimes you can't. It's really peculiar.
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I found myself in Zurich Airport. I'd done a TV show, oddly enough, with Mavis Staples. That's the way they do it in Switzerland. And I'd had a bit of a late night with members of her band. And I was - my flight was delayed. And I was sitting in the airport, and I just came up with the idea. And by the time, we landed at Heathrow, I'd pretty much sort of got it.
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As soon as one of my records goes on, it makes a vast portion of the public nervous. They get spooked by it. To some people who have ears to hear, it's a delightful, refreshing change. But to most of the public, it's a load of homemade-sounding nonsense.
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I don't have the faith now. I certainly believe in Jesus - you know, that he existed and he was a very nice man. And who can disagree with a simple philosophy of treat other people like you'd like to be treated yourself? It's absolutely - nothing I can disagree with that.
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When somebody like Elvis Costello comes along, anybody can make a good record with him.
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The world is full of musicians who can play great, and you wouldn't cross the road to see them. It's people who have this indefinable attitude that are the good ones.
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When punk rock came along, the one thing you were not supposed to be was musical.
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London was a real dump in the 70s, when it belonged to me and my friends, because, like most cities, you kind of hand them off. You're in charge for a bit and then you don't go out anymore. You say, "Oh god, it's going to be too crowded."
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If a hit came along, I wouldn't be unhappy about that. But I'm a bit too old for that now-doing videos and all those types of TV shows. I've kind of done all that, in the '70s.
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Later in life, suddenly, if you're an outsider, it's something to be celebrated, I think, rather than getting on people's nerves.
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I've always felt kind of like an outsider, even when I was very successful back in the old days. Even then. I kind of enjoyed it, really.
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I suppose I was waiting until I was old enough to have some sort of experience to sing about. When you're young, it's hard to sing the blues. Nobody believes you.
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So where are the strongAnd who are the trusted?And where is the harmony?Sweet harmony -'cause each time I feel it slippin away, it just makes me wanna cry:What's so funny 'bout Peace, Love, and Understanding?
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So you can be about your business, and then on it comes again. And this time you're ready, and you've got a wine glass or something. And you put the glass up to the wall, and you can hear through the wall a little bit more of the song - maybe just the middle bit this time. You know, you managed to get in a little bit of the end. And so it goes on until - because you just got to - you really just want to sing it.
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In the '70s, you had to come up with an album every year whether you were ready or not.