Andrew Bird Quotes

The idea of writing songs because you're depressed and you need to communicate it somehow, that isn't really true for me.

The problem is, when you're working with orchestras, you only get the orchestra for about two hours before the performance to pull it all together, and that doesn't sound like a real collaboration.

I am, in some sense, a writer. Even though I kinda downplay the word thing, I do enjoy writing sometimes.

It's not set in stone. I like to keep it rolling and changing, and so I am like, "Great, I get to remake my song."

Music as a social conduit has always been important to me.

The anti-aging advert that I would like to see is a baby covered in cream saying, 'Aah, I've used too much'

There's kind of this unequaled thrill of playing a half-finished song, it's kind of sense of slight embarrassment; like you're blushing. I like doing that. I did that with "Eyeoneye" and it was almost a curse on the song for a while; I debuted it when it was half-finished in a very public way

Guitars are kind of just, you know, sexy, especially old vintage ones.

I've done my share of busking, and it's fun until it isn't. There are musicians in the subways that will make you cry, they're so good.

There's always a tension between wanting to write a really concise, instant gratification type song that gets under your skin the first time you hear it, and wanting to really stretch out. I think it's a healthy tension.

Just don't let the human factor fail to be a factor at all

I don't like to disappear between records. I like to play shows while I'm making the record.

I definitely have to give myself permission, like on "Master Swarm," to rip a lead on that. Just play a violin solo that's - it's a bit showoff-y, but it's fun, so who cares?

With the words, a lot of things start with questions. Some word kind of piques my interest, and I love the way it sounds, but I really don't know what it means. And I honestly don't care for a while.

I don't like super-descriptive modern fiction. I like, "Here's what was happening in 1582 all over the planet." Then that gets my imagination going.

I really believe there's more honesty in one live show than there may be in my whole output.

When I start asking my friends, "What do you think this means?" And it leads to way more interesting conversations than what it actually ends up meaning in the dictionary. Like "apocryphal," for instance.

My favorite literature to read is fairly dry history. I like the framework, and my imagination can do the rest.

The earth almost looks like it's packed down and dense from so many feet treading over it.

You travel with the hope that something unexpected will happen. It has to do with enjoying being lost and figuring it out and the satisfaction. I always get a little disappointed when I know too well where I’m going, or when I’ve lived in a place so long that there’s no chance I could possibly get lost.

I have some irrepressible pop impulses to write an appealing, concise song. And I also have some irrepressible kind of restlessness as well, and I need to keep myself interested. When I'm left to my own devices, there's a struggle.

Sometimes I just think we're not meant to fly halfway around the world in a day. That some kind of mutation is going to happen.

I'm not a home-studio guy. I spend a lot of time working by myself developing songs, but I really need some other counterpart to help me pull it all together, because you go nuts working if I had to finish an entire project all within my own head.

I didn't have the patience for the research, or anything like that. I just like how it sets the imagination off. It's just an area that's very fertile for great words. Great metaphors, potentially.

I don't write poetry and then strum some chords and then fit the words on top of the chords.

I've always found that whatever you say about indie rock, it is the most inclusive genre or title for anything. It doesn't pin you down too much, like other labels would. It's just newer, it has less baggage.

What you see at the Field Museum is only like, 10 percent of the collection. It's birds of paradise and passenger pigeons and in all these drawers that pull out, these specimens come out and it's spectacular. And it worked out.

I still play solo shows. And some of those shows are still some of the best, most gratifying shows.

I still kind of believe this absurd line that if you have to write it down, it's not worth remembering.

I really like the sound of analog things where clearly there's something being touched. You can sense that something is handmade. So much with digital, there's a disconnect.

I think jazz was just seeking respect and validity because a lot of people didn't believe it was a viable art form, and then they got a lot of attention in Europe. A lot of bands that can't catch flies in the US have these followings in Europe, [but] it's less and less the case. American audiences are way more sophisticated and adventurous than anyone thinks that they are.

Correlation across replicated environments adds a whole new dimension of complexity of the environment, ... You would expect most application groups to have the same set of policies. In reality, you have differences in policies. That reflects back to that whole process of manual storing in the environment.

I guess I'm attracted to more archaic words because they can be imbued with more meaning, because their definition is elusive.

Playing the violin and singing and whistling are just three different ways of making sound.

Some of my earlier songs are kind of more about mental illness.

I don't get particularly precious about things like this, though. Like the record company said, "We need a radio edit that delivers the hook" - I don't even know what they consider the hook in that song ["Oh No"] - "that delivers the hook sooner." So I'm like, "Okay. I see that." And they were all walking on eggshells, like is this going to be sacrilegious to me or something, to mess with this art I've created? And I'm like, "Great. I get to tinker with it, I get to mess with my song some more."

No, it's not dissatisfaction that inspires me to tinker with my songs, it's just restlessness.

Every time I make a record, it's kind of like scarification or something. You work 15 hours until you're stupid. You're just kind of all jittery.

Playing the violin and singing and whistling are just three different ways of making sound. It's not trying to replace a band, per se. It's become a completely different thing. And it's not just simply an effect. It's just a very surprisingly intuitive thing.

People who are thinking about your music almost as much as you are, that almost never happens.

There's songs that could either be taken as a conversation between two people, like "The Privateers," or "Why," from a much earlier record. Or "Glass Figurine." That's my version of a relationship song.

I've always felt that dark lyrics with dark music is pretty useless. Maybe that's a strong statement - not useless, but for me, it's just boring.

There's always that struggle between me wanting to keep [song] new and fresh and then be - I can never get with pop songs being so repetitive.

I'm into lately being a little less precious about writing and being like, "Okay, what if I just locked myself in my room, pretend that there's someone outside with a gun that's saying, 'Don't come out until you write something.'"

Most records, you build from the drums and bass up. This one, we started with the vocals in Nashville and recorded them live with just the guitars and tried to make that complete and lovely-sounding without any adornment at all. I really wanted to get something with the vocal that I've never gotten before Armchair Apocrypha.

I haven't had that many people onstage for a while, and I'm looking forward to that. They're all such creative musicians in their own right. They're all complete individuals. They're not just a pick-up band. They all have their own thing going on.

Every time I get up in the morning, melodies occur to me and I start trying to shape lyrics to melodies.

Songwriting requires some sort of ceremony to even get the process started, and it can be somewhat arbitrary.