Roxy Music Quotes
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I still do mostly listen to CDs. I think that every format really is a different way of listening. If you take a different sort of psychological stance to it - like, I think the transition from vinyl to CD definitely marked a difference in the way people treated music. The vinyl commands a certain kind of reverence because it's a big object and quite fragile so you handle it rather carefully, and it's expensive so you pay attention to how it's looked after.
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If you are part of a religion that very strongly insists that you believe then to decide not to do that is quite a big hurdle to jump over. You never forget the thought process you went through. It becomes part of your whole intellectual picture.
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'Two Voices,' from my album with Peter Schwalm, is an intact dream-poem. I awoke one night with an image of a piece of paper and all the words of the poem written on it, so I just blundered down to the kitchen table and 'copied it out.'
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A lot of the so-called systems composers have this thing that the system is always right. You don't fiddle with it at all. Well, I don't think that. I think the system is as right as you judge it to be. If for some reason you don't like a bit of it you must trust your intuition on that. I don't take a doctrinaire approach to systems.
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I got an amazing 10-CD set, it's the music that Alan Lomax recorded in Haiti in 1936. And what's incredible is how fantastic the drummers are and how off-the-grid they are. The liveliness is astonishing; they're just totally alive, these recordings. It's very interesting, to me, to be reminded of that, that there was a time when things were not that tight.
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The point about working is not to produce great stuff all the time, but to remain ready for when you can.
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Some people say Bowie is all surface style and second-hand ideas, but that sounds like a definition of pop to me.
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The dominant theory coming out of Hollywood is that peoples' attention spans are getting shorter and shorter and they need more stimulation.
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I'm always interested in something when it isn't familiar to me.
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Set up a situation that presents you with something slightly beyond your reach.
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I have lived in countries that were coming out of conflict: Ireland, South Africa, the Czech republic. People there are overflowing with energy.
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I occasionally meet people and they say, 'Oh, I was born to Discreet Music'... They always have very weird eyes, those people.
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All the best lyrics are written in ten minutes.
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I tour a lot, sometimes like a hundred shows a year.
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I'm actually an evangelical atheist, but there is something I recognise about religion: that it gives people a chance to surrender.
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People who are very confident in themselves aren't hurt by criticism. They make use of it.
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Given the chance, i'll die like a baby, on some faraway beach, when the season's over.
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I became a musician to be free, and freedom means pursuing your musical interests. So if you were tied to be in a band only, that probably would be too restrictive.
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I was perfectly happy about being in a pop group. Roxy Music was the perfect vehicle, and enabled me to continue with this parallel musical career, which had nothing to do with what the group were doing. It was more to do with the extension of British psychedelia.
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It's not a very high failure rate if you choose people that you really like the sound of.
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I see TV as a picture medium rather than a narrative medium.
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It's easy to forget that your best work is done when your attention is fully engaged.
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It must be quite difficult if you have a father who's sort of known. On the other hand, you can get a job in his band.
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Listening to something is an act of surrender.