Ed O'Brien Quotes

Yeah, but on the U.S Tour we threw a new song into the set almost every night. Ofcourse, you can't do too many new songs every night as they've never heard it.

I wish I had the guts and talent to be a good comedian. I love the idea of it, yet I'm terrified of it. I'd also love to play music in front of people.

My version of a stress dream is, really, showing up on a concert stage with a drum set and not knowing the chart.

There is always a mix of apprehension and excitement before you try songs out on a new audience.

When you get onstage, you can see everyone in the audience's face, down to the detail. You can see who may or may not be yawning.

Seeing bored-looking fans staring at you while you DJ is about as horrible as it gets.

Playing live is such a total visceral experience, and really, as a musician, you're trained from the beginning to be a live performer.

I still get thrilled by the energy that is a live performance, the fear and the panic and the electricity that happens on the night. I think jolting myself every once in a while with that fear is a good thing for me.

The first time I sang in front of an audience, I was about 14 - it was at my guitar school's showcase, and there were about 30 people there. I was so nervous, but I did it.

Before, I was terrified on stage. I only play guitar during the acoustic songs. After a while, you can elicit certain responses from the crowd, like Elvis.

I remember the first time I walked on that stage. Maxine and I were just a duet at the time, and we walked on that stage and did 'Looking Back to See.' Ernest Tubb introduced us at the time. I remember my knees were shaking.

I know what it feels like to walk out in front of a sold-out crowd of a thousand people that are there for you, and how good that feels, but as an opener, you just have to train yourself to think that it's going to be harder.

People have said I played some pretty amazing gigs in the seventies, but in all honesty, I probably played one good show in three.

I have no experience performing that music live in front of an audience. So that remains to be seen. I'm very excited to see what that's going to be like.

I played shows in front of like 25, 50 people, and it's a lot harder to do your thing in front of a crowd that's small.

I much prefer doing comedy. I get a little paranoid when the audience is not laughing.

I still do get a little bit nervous at the beginning of Maiden tours but that's mainly because of the new material.

That gets me upset- you're jamming along, checking out the crowd and having a good time, and then your equipment goes down. You can't just stop the show and say, 'Oh, Jeff's got a guitar problem.'

I'm ashamed to say it, but I watch YouTube videos of our live shows, wondering if it actually sounded the way it sounded when I was playing it, and the consistent thing I see is that you can feel the anxiety and the tension and it's over-aggressive a lot of the time.

I could have done a night at the O2 in London, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. I'm not being big-headed, but for my act I can't be talking to an audience of 12,000 people. There's no intimacy.

When I'm singing my songs on stage, I feel like I'm doing a rock show, even though I don't think all my music is particularly straight up rock.

Live performance is everything. First of all, I have terrible stage fright. But beyond that, once the music starts, it's OK.

The first show I did with Coldplay was really scary.

Playing new songs at festivals is weird, obviously. People at festivals are always a bit drunk, and probably just want to hear stuff they know by bands they love, or are checking you out and don't know your stuff very well.

I used to get butterflies. Now we're always ready to hit the stage and rock out.