'Material' is meant to be a fun, lighthearted song about the tiny bit of materialism that's in all of us. The message is meant to translate the notion that you don't need luxury items to feel special; you already are special.
I'm not good at happy, lightweight kind of music. I'm not really good at pop music. 'Cars' is probably the only true pop song I ever wrote. I wish I could write more, but I'm not very good at it.
I kind of miss writing songs the way that I used to write songs, in the sense that I would just sit down, and all these words that told a story would come out. There's one Bon Iver song called 'Blood Bank' that is more representative of an older lineage of songs, which I like and I sort of miss. But it just doesn't happen anymore for me.
You gotta make sure the listener is listening to you, so if you put it into a song, often times, if the song is striking enough, then you can really deliver the story most effectively while keeping the ear of the listener the whole time.
Throughout my career, if I have done anything, I have paid attention to every note and every word I sing - if I respect the song. If I cannot project this to a listener, I fail.
I don't like to get comfortable. I don't like to be like, 'Oh, my song is all over the place. I'm lit.' Nah, it makes me wanna keep working.
Like anything important, anything you need people to hear - you've got to have music for it. You've got to make it at least a little piece of a song or sometimes a whole song.
There was this song I was working on called 'Swing.' It was almost finished, but there was something missing, and I couldn't for the life of me figure it out. And then this little piece of information - this little tweet - came to the forefront of my mind.
I've always been a fan of melody and emotional melancholy, whether it was Rites of Spring or Tears for Fears or Neil Young. If I hear a song that has a sweet melody, I'm a sucker for it, whether it's Linkin Park or Little Richard.
I definitely like the oddballs. There's a song called 'Little Thing,' which is the only song that I have recorded that has no words. And it's the one that I get past my critic inside me.
If you want me to sing this Christmas song with the feeling and the meaning, you better see if you can locate that check.
You could play the blues like it was a lonesome thing - it was a feeling. The blues is nothing but a story... The verses which are sung in the blues is a true story, what people are doing... what they all went through. It's not just a song, see?
Every song is a long process. First I have to write a story for it, and then to make it into a song, I have to make it short and then shorter - so it's not easy!
I conceived 'All Is Song' as a modernised, loosely interpreted version of Socrates's life.
For a while, I felt a little self-impelled to write Lou Reed Kind of songs. I should have understood that a Lou Reed song was anything I wanted to write about.
I love Miranda Lambert; I think she's wonderful. I love the song 'Love Letters' and 'Famous in a Small Town.'
There's a certain feeling of giving, a certain feeling of generosity in love songs. When you sing a song of love, you're actually giving something to yourself, too. You're singing and casting these affirmations of love out into the universe.
There's a certain feeling of giving, a certain feeling of generosity in love songs. When you sing a song of love, you're actually giving something to yourself, too. You're singing and casting these affirmations of love out into the universe. It resonates in your body in a way that feels extraordinary.
'9 to 5,' that little song, that little story, just won't ever end. Just like 'I Will Always Love You,' it just keeps comin' back, popping up its head in one way or another.
When I wrote 'Fight Song,' I was in a particular low point. I needed to remind myself to not give up, that I still believed in myself and that I still had fight left.
