Phil Elverum Quotes

In other words, musicians know that going back to the Spoonful, what we were doing was not copying.

I try to take whatever I can from the songs I grew up listening to, these vibed-out pop numbers, and make them my own in some weird way.

I've always been a good imitator. I love music. But I'm just not that original.

What I've learned is that it's okay to take from heroes, such as Debussy, but it has to be filtered through my own personality so that ultimately it's me.

Composers shouldn't think too much - it interferes with their plagiarism.

It's easy for a singer to sometimes pick up on another singer's sound, but that's just copying.

I just watched a James Brown video of him singing 'I Feel Good,' and then I kind of just copied off his moves. But I couldn't do them properly, so they turned into my own moves.

What I do is, I look at rock guitar players, and I say to myself, 'What is this guy doing? What does he have that can inspire me?' I try to see what other people are doing and take what they have and turn it and twist it into my own thing.

I used to try to play like [Miles Davis], and Miles caught me copying him one night at Birdland. He said, 'Hey man, why don't you play some of your own stuff.' So, I finally did, because I had copied all his solos.

I'm not an original composer. The tunes are not stolen from other tunes necessarily except in a few cases, but they're in the style of songs that I grew up with.

I know there's bands that might write something that sounds like The Smiths, and they'll go, 'Oh, it sounds like The Smiths, we've got to make it sound not like The Smiths.'

It's a great honor when somebody takes your song and does something different with it. That's what music is all about: to constantly change what somebody else has done.

When a writer tries to copy another writer, it's doomed to fail.

I try to steal something from the great singers. Of course, I don't want to imitate their sound, but I try to do a sort of compromise.

I shall always respect the composer. If I embellish, it is his idea I am embellishing.

Even if you try to copy a film shot by shot, you still can't. It's still your own film.

I've always gone to see all kinds of shows and stole what I could, as we all do. We see an artist and hear a song and think, 'I bet I could sing that song. I'll put that in my show.'

Someone who copies a Van Gogh does not therefore become Van Gogh, and the same would go for Mozart or anyone else who contributed something that was original. Certainly in the way that I described visualizing numbers in abstract, meaningful shapes.

Being a cover artist is not like being a real artist. That's just copying what someone else did.

There were times in my career when I would try to write songs like Bob Dylan... Artists get hooked up in that. To be a follower, you lose.

It takes a long time to find your own voice. Along the way, you imitate all the things that influence you - in my case Johnny Cash, Bowie, John Lydon.

Why would I want to sound like Joni Mitchell? I've got Joni Mitchell records, and they're great, and I couldn't possibly be that good.

Our influences are who we are. It's rare that anything is an absolutely pure vision; even Daniel Johnston sounds like the Beatles. And that's the problem with the bands I'm always asked about, the ones derivative of the early Seattle sound. They don't dilute their influences enough.

I felt Michael Jackson was inspired a little bit more from the elegance of a Fred Astaire. Michael loved Sammy Davis, Jr. and James Brown and Judy Garland and Fred Astaire. But he wasn't any of those people. To be inspired is one thing, but he made it all his own.

I'm not trying to emulate or imitate. But I do believe that I embody that spirit from Robert Johnson on up.