Almost every band has somebody who's the main songwriter and who has a vision, a very clear idea of how a song should be.
Stephen MalkmusI like a narrative, even if it's fractured, or kind of psychedelic. But my favorite thing is if I hear words and I close my eyes and the connotations or the image I get in my head, combine with the sound of them - sometimes phonetics. I'm just stringing those together.
Stephen MalkmusWe care if people like what we did. If you're just making records for yourself, why put them out and do all these interviews and do touring? I'm a huge music fan, and this is what I do with my artistic time. It's all I really do, except hang out with my family. I value human relationships, and it's a way for me to interact with the world and feel like I'm part of something.
Stephen MalkmusWith some songs, I have written narratives or I've tried to carry it through, but generally the things that were more genius, as far as I was concerned, were not that.
Stephen Malkmus