My dad used to say to me, 'You look more like me than I do.'
Dhani Harrison
I sometimes listen to music I made and find it to be something I wouldn't want to buy from a store, if there was a store. When it's like that, you have to make what you want to hear.
Being in L.A. is great because there are so many weird people out there, so you can just blend in. I like that.
You can' t help being a musician because you've grown up with music, yet being one means being compared to your dad and being slated for it. But I really don't have the ambitions of most people going into the industry.
Websites are kind of useless. There's so much great web content and design out there, but the ways in which they are being experienced are not being maximized.
I suddenly realized that in order to do what I wanted to do, I had to become that which I hated - which is the head of a record company or a digital media conglomerate - and just do whatever you want.
I did rebel. I was the rebel in my family, because my dad wanted me to go and just travel with him.
Thenewno2 is sort of my little prototype band, really.
I was recording stuff with my dad when I was like five, six years old. I played with him on tour. I'd gone with him to Japan in '91, played some gigs, did a couple shows at the Albert Hall.
'Keep your head down at school.' Those are sage words from my dad. They kept me in check for years.
I think guitar-wise, Eric Clapton was a big influence on me. I got to spend time around him. He's kind of strange, mysterious, serious and he always has played such hot guitar.
It was a relief to be able to do my own band, because I was very responsible for all this amazing music I didn't want to mess up before.
I have two mini huskies called Woody Guthrie and Edison Guthrie.
When my dad toured in '91, I think my first gig properly was the Tokyo Dome, 50,000 people indoors. That was pretty scary. I was 12, or 13.
My job description is... being enthusiastic.
One interviewer asked me: 'How do you feel that you've betrayed your father?' That wasn't really very cool.
I've grown up around cinema. Michael Kamen was a very, very close friend of mine, sort of my godfather. So I know how much work goes into it. You have to know what you're doing.
I don't really plan to be a pop star; I just want to be able to make music without the whole My Dad thing hanging over me, which everyone in my position goes through.
To come out in the music business, you only really get one shot. A lot of people get to play small gigs first, and build up that way, without anyone really seeing them.
Someone recently played me 'Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell' by Das Racist. That should be my theme song.
I did everything I could to not be a musician.
I was an only child. I hung out with my parents.
In almost any profession, even if you're the kid of an actor, people are very supportive and want to see the next generation.
It's funny, because music is one of those things it is natural to go into. You hear it so much growing up, it kind of permeates you and eventually you spew out some music of your own.
The music I want to hear in my head sounds somewhere between Jimi Hendrix and Massive Attack. It's not really like my dad, but there will always be similarities because we have the same vocal cords, and I learnt the guitar the way he taught me.
I was very empty after my father passed away. It was an emotional time, as it would be for anyone, but to be in the studio every day was kind of cathartic and healing and it just seemed very natural to continue.
Everyone's seen the Beatles.
I'm a huge Wu-Tang fan.
I only discovered electronic music as a teenager and I still love the Prodigy and Massive Attack.
I'm still getting used to being called a composer. A poseur, maybe.
I recently got into 'Lie to Me' with Tim Roth and 'The Mentalist.'
You don't have to burn books, you don't have to rebel against teachers to rebel; to rebel is to truly own your own self.
I don't ever use my name for anything in terms of getting the music heard.
I think I learned a lot about not buying into a lot of hype. I wanted to be a kind of faceless entity; I didn't want to be Dhani Harrison and the Muppets or something like that.
Playing music has always felt very natural. You know, you do try to do other things, and you do learn lessons that way, but, eventually - well... if your dad is a plumber, you become a plumber. It's the family business, and I felt like I was taking over the family business.
I could never just play in a pub in front of four people because I would have had all the press turn up. That way, you don't get to build up naturally. It makes the work feel unnatural, and puts a lot of unnatural pressure on you.
I never really saw my dad around when the Iron Maiden and the AC/DC were playing. But he knew what I was doing. I was just absorbing music. So he just kind of left me to my own devices.
I love getting into a studio with a bunch of friends. When the day's done, we've made something. We recognize that we're from different walks of the music industry, and there's no reason we shouldn't be collaborating. That's what I'm trying to create with thenewno2 - a sense of community.
'Live a Lie' is inspired by recent combinations found in dubstep.
I did Albert Hall, I got to play the Hall of Fame with Prince. So I've done that kind of stuff for ages. It wasn't until after we finished working on Brainwash, my dad's album after he died, then it was like 'That phase is over in my life now, now we can get on with our music, with our band.'
If you were the first person ever to design an application for the iPhone and you patented it, you would be very, very better off than we are right now, you know? But you've got to be the first one to do it. So I figured that Led Zeppelin or the Stones were going to do it unless we just got on to it. So I got cracking with the guys from Apple.
