All you gotta do is think of the song in your head. And it doesn't matter whether you can play it or not, you can get somebody to play it. With songs I've written, there's a song called "The Statue", which I can't play. There are songs that I've written that I've actually just hummed on - there's a song on one of the albums they have there on the Internet called "My Love Was True" and it's almost operatic. I can't play it. But I can sing it.
Don McLeanWe live in a world of empty spectacle, the world of spectacle rock, songs you can't remember, it's all about the expression of money, power and kind of empty and fascistic. Where technology has changed society, where people are not using their brains as much, not seeing the bigger picture but constantly looking down at the cellphone and not seeing the bigger picture. Today's songwriter need to be on outside, find their own trip if you will and find a way to connect from a place that no one has heard before. It might be taken as weird but that is what makes it unique.
Don McLeanI've always been on the outside of all that political stuff so I just sort of watch it and I'm appalled and I think people should be screaming about a lot of things right now and they're not. They're just letting everything happen. I don't know. At some point the wheels are going to come off and we're going to have a real problem. The people are going to get angry and it's going to be too late.
Don McLeanI had asthma when I was a kid, asthma so bad that it would turn into pneumonia and I almost died several times. Nobody knew why back then, but now it's obvious.
Don McLeanI don't relate to what's left of the music business. There doesn't seem to be any point to it anymore. The business that I grew up in and loved, we made records a different way - there were record companies, there were stores where you could buy albums.
Don McLeanStarry, starry night, flaming flowers that brightly blaze, swirling clouds in violet haze reflect Vincent's eyes of china blue.
Don McLeanThere's enough ugliness - you know, we got wars going on and people dying and sickness and everything. We don't need to have our art be ugly. But it is, in a lot of it. And these people justify this crap by saying, "Oh we're just representing what's out there, man". Basically, you're making it worse and number one, the artist's job is to elevate people and to lift people up and to give them a place to go, something to hold on to.
Don McLean