France was very opposite of the show-business experience I'd been living; I was anonymous and alone. I wore no makeup, wore the same clothes every day. And I wrote and wrote and wrote.
Tift Merritt
You can always boil down the life of a musician to touring, playing, and writing.
I think you need a concrete, real-world metaphor to talk about inner life without feeling like a jerk.
I wanted to dedicate myself completely to the things that matter to me and let everything else go, and I think that's a really rewarding thing.
I think you have to ask questions that are scary to ask, and you cannot apologize for that, and you cannot worry what anyone else thinks about your journey.
I really love music, and I definitely love playing music and getting to be a part of music.
Music is like a really sacred, awesome thing. That first 45 minutes to two hours that you're on stage spending time with music every night is always really great.
I think that there are a lot of things that come along with being a musician, but I don't want to whine about them. I don't want to complain about my job.
My point of view as a writer has to be a lot more ego-less than just like being some performer on stage with a hairdo.
I'm always kind of surprised how much I'm associated with country music.
I think, at the end of the day, I have an outsider's heart.
I was thinking about how a playlist is really so inadequate as opposed to a mixtape because it takes seventeen days to really make a mixtape with a homemade cover that you like and that you'd give away.
Sometimes when you're writing on a ukulele, you're in a totally new land, rhythmically or melodically.
I'm a writer, first and foremost, and I sort of take my cues from the songwriters of the '70s, who are talking about what's really important to them.
As much as I love being a singer-songwriter, I love throwing down on stage and letting it all out.
I travel in a Ford Econoline van with a trailer. So it's not quite so glamorous.
My work is has always been very, very personal.
In France, I discovered that I love writing in the city. There's such an intensity to being in the city that matches the intensity of what you're experiencing in your head.
The thought of making work that's easily consumed and quickly forgotten - what's the point? I want my work to be cohesive, to age and improve like old leather.
I don't want to be overly philosophical, but I think there are things you earn for yourself as you go.
When I was nominated for a Grammy, my label dropped me - I have a wariness about trying for a hit.
