Musician Quotes

I won't say I've closed the door on acting.

I pick up my guitar and play. Something might come, and then the pen comes out. Then an edit, until something comes out that you're actually satisfied with.

I only ever really take out my guitar when I'm miserable, which isn't necessarily a very good time to do it.

I love the idea of leaving some of the original abstract thought in, because the problem is that when you pick up a pen you become a snob, your own worse critic. You edit yourself in a way that is non-creative.

I guess in a way I just feel blessed to be able to make music.

I choose to believe that there is good in people and that everything is a lesson. Our place on Earth is to go deeper, to somehow get wiser. To have spirit.

I busked from the age of 13 until I was 18.

Do I create conflicts for myself? Sure I do.

As a busker, one thing that does not work is self-consciousness. A busker needs to be working. A busker needs to shed all ego and get down to work. Play your songs, play them well, earn your money, and don't get in people's way.

And I've always loved playing solo.

And for some reason, when I'm sad, I do listen to Leonard Cohen, I do listen to Joni Mitchell. I do find myself going to the music that's actually reflecting my mood, as opposed to sticking on Motown, which might actually bring my mood up.

A song is like a saddle: you ride it for a while, and if it's the right kind of song you can sing it for the rest of your life.

You learn that the only way to get rock-star power as a girl is to be a groupie and bare your breasts and get chosen for the night. We learn that the only way to get anywhere is through men. And it's a lie.

You don't have to have magic unicorn powers. You work at it, and you get better. It's like anything: You sit there and do it every day, and eventually you get good at it.

Women didn't want to be on the stage with other women because they didn't want their bodies to be compared. They didn't want another female act opening for them because of this weird competitive and tokenistic attitude.

There are so many great artists that are doing interesting things, that I don't want to focus on boring people.

So many women have experienced horrific forms of male violence throughout their lives, and why isn't there a song about how you get depressed because of it?

People have always had these weird things about how you have to be really good looking to be a singer.

It's unexpected for women's issues to be brought up in places other than women's centers on college campuses or crisis places.

If I had to choose between the band or the friendships, I'd choose the friendships at this point.

I was in a band in the '90s called Bikini Kill, and we were so freaked out about documentation then, and there was the whole thing, not just about the male gaze, but that people were going to misrepresent you... a kind fear of the mainstream that a lot of us had.

I wanted to say to myself as much as anyone else that we made art.

I wanted to make something that I wanted to hear that I wasn't hearing.

I think as a culture, we don't like conflict or looking at icky stuff - especially in our downtime.

I really like to talk about my work in a way that is complicated.

I just write what I want to write.

I felt it was really, really important, not just in the vein of feminist erasure or whatever but also just as an artist that I honored my work.

Art revolves around creating something that isn't there.

Certain people are like 'Oh, here come the Feminazis!' You end up acting 10 times nicer than you even need to be, to be the opposite of the stereotype like 'You're the man haters!' We're always bending over backwards being extra nice. And I don't know if being nice is my legacy.

I'm just working and having a good time and seeing what develops, which is so awesome, because you don't know what's going to happen, and I'm letting myself do that a lot more than I ever have.