As far as trying to make it terms of social hierarchy or status and all that in art and music - I've always felt that that stuff was bullshit. It's got very little to do with reality, and reality is where things live. You look at a painting and think, "Oh, it's beautiful. It inspires me," whatever. But it's never going to inspire you like reality. A lot of these artists and musicians who prioritize skill over experience, they sit around masturbating themselves over knowledge and intellect rather than just going to a place.
Willis Earl BealI think the best way to listen to my music is through recording. I would love to be one of those artists where you can go into a coffee shop and watch people pass by and then my music is in their ears. Not necessarily a sensory deprivation thing, but that's cool too. Unfortunately in order to focus on nobody else, you would probably have to go into a dark room and just sit there and listen to it.
Willis Earl BealI never actually sexually attacked anybody. But I'm a writer, too, and I was always trying to figure out a way to recreate the experience of being this Albert Camus, Stranger-like solitary protagonist character without incriminating myself in any way, like, "Oh, what a perv!" I want to reach out to anybody out there who may have been riding on the train one time when things in their life were completely falling apart and saw a girl's legs in a skirt and it's the last bit of goodness that you can see.
Willis Earl BealThe truth is, all products - mine included - will take you away from yourself. You can listen to this music and think its pretty cool - or not - but the only thing that's going to save your soul is going somewhere alone and staying in that place for a while. Do something for yourself.
Willis Earl BealPeople tend to believe that I want to make soul music, which is not entirely untrue but, really, I want to be like the black Tom Waits - I don't want to make one kind of sound.
Willis Earl BealOne of my struggles is that I'm a glutton. There's always those very simple, long, old-ass things, but they're very real to me, and I'm sitting in them, and they're swirling in my mind all the time. I tell people about it and they think, "Why don't you just go and make some money, go get a big-screen TV, or look at the Internet." Or they say, "Go create some introspective art." I just want to explode. I don't know how everybody else is able to walk around so calm. It's amazing to me when I see people walking so calmly down the street. I envy them, but I also kind of hate them.
Willis Earl BealIf the only thing that you want to do is make money - if that's your whole motivation - I think you're lying to yourself. If the only motivation you have is to make money and make it, what's making it? Oh, you get a yacht or an island. Well, you're going to need someone to be on that island. You're going to need people, one way or another.
Willis Earl Beal