Foster the People Quotes
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I wrote 'Torches' before experiencing touring as a band. I really had no idea what they would sound like live, and that was something we had to figure out along the way.
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Pressure has always been more of a friend than a foe for me with songwriting.
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I've written so many songs that are hopeful - songs that are, like, about an old man that gives all his possessions away because he wants to help people. I wrote 'Pumped Up Kicks' just to tell a different type of story.
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Going out and volunteering sounds simple, but many people don't volunteer because they don't know where to start.
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I love exploring music.
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When I'm writing songs, my favourite thing to do is to try and rabbit-trail and go places I've never gone to before. Just like exploring a new terrain or a new country or something.
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I think that there's a difference between being an entertainer and being an artist.
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I feel like trying to write a song in order to be a big hit is just not something I'm interested in because it's not going to come from an authentic place of expression.
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I was an only child, so I was alone a lot.
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When I was 21, I was in a pretty serious band, and we almost got signed - went to New York, showcased, all that - but didn't end up getting signed, and we broke up. I went back to the drawing board; I really took a hit from that whole experience.
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I realized probably when I was, like, 20 years old that the hardest thing to do is to write a pop song - not, like, a candy-pop, throwaway pop song.
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The phrase 'pumped up kicks,' man, I was excited when I came up with that.
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I want to make music for everyone. I'm not trying to start a super exclusive group. I don't want a clique of people where you have to wear a certain type of clothes to come to our shows, or you have to be the ages of this and this.
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I didn't record 'Pumped Up Kicks' out of a sense of moral obligation.
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'Supermodel' was a hard record for me; it was an emotional record to write. I was purging a lot of stuff with that album, and I think the one thing I didn't really consider, that I'd be supporting it for two years and living in that state of mind every night.
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I'm not really worried about writer's block.
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There are career waiters in Los Angeles, and they're making over $100,000 a year.
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In Morocco, a Muslim country, I got to hear the call to prayer five times a day. At first it felt kind of scary, kind of dangerous, because of the propaganda towards anything Muslim in the U.S. subconsciously coming out in me. By the end of the trip, it was so beautiful, and then not hearing it when I got back to L.A. really threw me off.
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Travelling alone was like laundry for my thoughts.
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I love countermelodies, I love hooks and melodies that stick in your head. If I could put 20 melodies in a song and they would all work together, I would.
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With 'Torches,' I wanted to make a great pop record; I wanted every song to be exciting, not to have too much space, no long pieces of music without vocals. I kind of wanted to write the perfect pop album.
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I don't consider myself an entertainer. I consider myself an artist, and I think with that comes responsibility.
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There's just really interesting facets of culture just swirling in Morocco. They all have slightly different colours, so it's just an inspiring place to be.
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Art is observing society around you, representing it through your eyes.