Quote

It's normally in the morning, just playing around. And I'm not saying everything I make is great, but that's what I do. I can't even remember how I wrote stuff.

Stephen Malkmus

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Stephen Malkmus
Age: 58
Born: 1966
Born: May 30
Guitarist
Musician
Singer
Singer-Songwriter
Songwriter
Santa Monica
California
Stephen Joseph Malkmus
Remember
Everything
Normally
Great
Wrote
Even
Playing
Make
Saying
Morning
Stuff
Around

More quotes by Stephen Malkmus

Image
I'm not dying for things to say.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
If you want to be negative about the whole thing you can say all guitar bands after the Beatles were just a waste of time because the Beatles were the best. I think it's far better to give new records a try.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
Like the song Stereo, to me that's like, kind of hip-hop in that slacker way. There's some slackerisms mixed in with that stuff, but it wasn't really conscious, I guess. When things would get more typical rock'n'roll that was my fallback to go to those kind of lyrics instead of the alternatives.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
I don't really know where the songs are coming from often. Many of the best things I made up were just off the top of my head.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
So much of rock lyrics is just a mirror of real feeling. It doesn't feel dangerous to me. They just feel like rock lyrics.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
The earlier stuff is more like this is happening to me, but now there are more songs that are accusatory or something, or more declaratory. I don't know where that voice comes from, like, I've been down the road, we've been there and done that. That's sort of like a tougher style, or a less vulnerable style.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
What I love about music, when you can look at something and be like, Wow, what's this all about? You can't really picture what these people look like - is it one guy, or a band making music in a garage?
Stephen Malkmus
Image
I want to do some different kind of songs, but say I want to do riffs, but I don't come up with any riffs that I really think are great. Then I can't do a riff album. I'm more of a song, melody person.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
My wife says that I changed people's lives or ways of thinking and that I should always be proud and grateful. If I'm dismissive of what we do sometimes, a little bit, she's like, I was a fan, you changed my life, or whatever. That's what she says.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
I think most musicians know if they make the same record twice, even if they say they don't.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
Something taken off the page can sound great, I guess. Usually it doesn't. It seems like lately Pitchfork is trying to champion lyric writers more.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
Obviously songs and musicians mean a lot to people.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
I'm more into describing a scenario and I move around in that scenario.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
Well, you know, it's a younger person, and it was maybe an effort to be a little more sincere and adult about the lyrics occasionally, which is a good thing. It's nice that it's not too self-conscious like some of our lyrics could be.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
When I see four young kids in a band, I think, That looks really fun, no matter how shitty they are. You develop your own thing, and get excited about your band name. It's all so harmless.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
I didn't really like confessional poetry or things. They seemed sort of dated to me, or just corny.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
I'm better when I'm an autodidact and things just come. Or you're just blessed. I'm not bragging or anything, it just comes to you.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
Most people want to be seen or heard. You want to shine. That's my way of shining.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
What we're doing now, it's usually more based on records that I've bought or a projection of what I can do well now and the inner dynamics of playing with the people I'm playing with, Janet Weiss and Joanna Bolme, what we come up with. What works for us doesn't, like, have that much relation to the past.
Stephen Malkmus
Image
We [ Paverment] were definitely unafraid of playing wrong notes and singing wrong things. We could be fearlessly bad!
Stephen Malkmus