Everybody talking about being afraid of being boring is boring. You have to go for the real substance of life after awhile.
Lou Barlow
Harmony Korine, the screenwriter, was really into my early work. I did a lot of stuff under the name Sentridoh and a lot of 4-track cassette stuff that he was into.
I love Devo. There's nothing not to like.
At 12 or 13, I picked up a guitar because my mother made me learn how to play.
My experience with Dino Jr. proved that making new music was a worthwhile pursuit.
Don Henley is real fallback for awfulness.
With every performance I just feel more energized somehow. Like, this is how I exercise! This is how I feed my ego, by playing this loud rock music.
I think all food except for maybe pizza and Mexican food is better in Japan.
If you make a strange, eccentric record - like the Velvet Underground's 'White Light/White Heat' - it takes on its own mood because it's less about a shrewd marketing plan; it's more about an individual emotion.
Someone who's a really good engineer is someone who's a little bit smarter than you but who also listens to you and doesn't impose agendas.
I don't know what ontological means... I barely graduated high school, and I have never heard that word in conversation.
I don't know if i have a 'take' on L.A. The music community is enormous, from the studio musicians to the bands trying to 'make it' to the indie bands... so many bands... it can be overwhelming. But it seems healthy.
I love making records, and part of really doing that and being happy about it is just that each time I've done something, I come to terms with what maybe is wrong with it, and then I move on to the next thing.
I've put out a lot of stuff that just confused and alienated people: a huge chunk of songs that were verbal and musical challenges to myself, thoughts I was keeping myself busy with, nothing I had any intention of anybody grasping onto.
One thing about when I came back into Dinosaur that was really cool was that pretty much anybody that J. was working with who had a long-term relationship with J. were people I really liked and that I actually may have already known.
I went back and reread the Dinosaur chapter in 'Our Band Could Be Your Life,' and it was so depressing.
When you're in a band, it's kind of a big thing to be friends as well.
Literally everything I do is either write songs and play music, or I'm immersed in my domestic life.
Some of my songs are positive and stuff, but some are about staring down at the ground and obsessing about stupid things, and it is teenage in a way.
I'm fully aware, I've gotten terrible reviews my entire career. It's not a really big deal; it's something I can deal with.
People in the Midwest, there's a lot of regional pride and a lot more, like, fake positivity - 'That's great - you're awesome!'
I've never been good at playing live in front of people.
Los Angeles was really beautiful, and California in general is a great place to live.
Just from the beginning, I really liked playing around with tape recorders. And then, when I got into punk rock, I only really liked - the rawer it was, the more I was into it.
At nine or ten, I was playing guitar in music class in my elementary school in Jackson, Michigan. They had a guitar class, and I played with ten of my classmates, and we did a little guitar orchestra for a school music.
I had a very strong 'revertigo' for becoming the kid that I was when I was in Dinosaur Jr. That's a pretty insecure place that I was in.
My family is the epicenter of my life.
I like all the obnoxious Eagles stuff that just drives people crazy. I love 'Life In The Fast Lane' and 'Hotel California.'
I've always tried to make music for someone who's never heard anything I've ever done.
When I was a teenager, my mom got me a really nice baritone ukulele.
For me, it's hard to enter any situation with people where we're considering everyone equals, because I bring all of this massive baggage into anything that I do, preconceptions of my work. That's a lot for the people that I might be bringing along with me to bear.
Now, when I have a four-string that I take on the road with me, it's a regular Martin. I bought a decent Martin with a pickup in it, and then I just take off the strings and have four strings on it.
I can finish a show and walk through the audience without being recognized.
I prefer to read into other people's songs what I want to hear in them.
I wrote a song for my sister's wedding.
To bicker over what could have been is silly.
Coming back to Dinosaur Jr. and actually writing songs for the band was really intense for me.
I'm a huge Zombies fan.
I've been trying to cut down on caffeine because it seems to aggravate my middle-age-onset acne, but I'm too tired to care. I'm growing a beard to hide it.
I remember being inspired by this band Godflesh, actually. They were a really heavy metal band, really nihilistic.
J. makes me laugh. He's incredibly dry and has a pretty harsh sense of humor that I enjoy.
I enjoy Dinosaur for what it is. It's a unique band that has a unique chemistry.
I always felt that when people found things that they didn't like about me, it seemed to distance them from me.
I wrote 'Healthy Sick,' from our first LP, when I was 19. I'll happily play it till I'm 91 because it always feels good and truthful.
I'm the Folk Implosion's biggest fan.
To be doing interviews in 2006 for a band I was kicked out of in 1989 - a band that I never thought I would play for again - in a way, it's weird.
That's what I've figured out over the years - the way I write makes people feel uncomfortable.
The first songs I ever wrote - my first, like, serious offerings - were all written on ukulele. It's always been a part of the way I write for a really long time.
If you put heavy, regular classic guitar strings on a baritone ukulele, it gets pretty low. It has a really nice, low, warm feel to it.
From when I young, a lot of the things I grappled with, with instruments, was how large they were. When someone places a large guitar in your lap, it's hard - I'd learned how to play a guitar when I was a kid, but I never really felt like I was in control.
