 I actually think sadness and darkness can be very beautiful and healing. |
| And frankly, when I made that record, hit songs were not what I was trying to achieve. |
| I'm fortunate I have this coterie of musicians around me to help take music to next level. Being surrounded by so much creative energy, so many creative people really feeds that creativity in me. |
| Simon Hale, the British arranger, does all string and wood arrangements on my records. |
| It's inevitable your environment will influence what you do. |
| For my second record I had gotten ProTools (program) and started to familiar myself with hard disc recording. |
| If I were to do this over I'd play a lot more shows before I made a record. |
| The experiences of promoting my first album were really something; there is so much illusion in my environment (touring and pop music) that I wanted to clear away. |
| I think in a way I was probably completely naive about what it takes to make something become a hit. |
| I'd have these weird experiences where I'd just be walking down the street with this chord progression in my head, this happened more than a few times, and I'd walk home and find a fax in my machine and it would match the music in my head. |
| My second record was all about big ideas - I was trying to make big statements about the culture, about life. I think in a certain way, I was a 27 year old kid with a guitar. |
| I feel fortunate about being able to make the music I want to make and getting away with it. |
| I mean, at the end of the day when I'm making a record, what I want to do is what I do. |
| I actually am always a music first person. |
| I also wanted to make a record that was about other things than romance, yeah, after two years on the road singing all the songs from the first album, I got kind of tired of that. |
| But really important, perhaps most important is the craft; how you make your record, the creation of these sonic worlds you want your listener to hear. |
