Chris Lowe Quotes

I tend to write and record things quite quickly. You can tamper with things for years, and it's artistic laziness sometimes.

For anybody who writes, very often, when you finish an album, you are so done with it. You've been listening in minutia, in super-focus.

I've already got notebooks full of ideas for new music, so I'm gonna kind of nurture that just like I do all of my ideas and perfect it until it's ready and then I'll just let it go.

I'm so hard on myself that when I'm in the studio, I'll write 10 songs and only use one. So those nine songs that are left over, I always think, 'Where could these go? Who could they be for?'

You know, I've released some great records and I've released some dogs. But frankly, the fun is in creating the thing.

You can never really judge your work because once it's done, it's done.

When I listen to my own records, I always think, 'Oh, I could have sung that so much better.' But you have to finish something and turn it in. If I didn't have folks who say, 'Come on, we need the record now,' I probably would never finish one.

You can work on an album forever, but finishing it is a whole different deal.

So many of my paintings, people would be like, 'What more do you have to do?' But the smallest little things make all of the difference.

I think, for me, a way to really come up with new ideas and come up with new ways of writing music is to create a unique sound palette or soundscape for all the films I'm working on.

Sometimes I go in and try to write beats, but I just trash 'em, and then the next time I go in, I'll make like six beats - six legit, nice beats. I'm really particular with how it needs to sound.

I doubt Picasso ever painted a picture in an hour, he took his time, looked at every detail and made sure it was perfect.

I think I can recognize when a piece is at a state of completion.

I don't listen to my songs. The only time I do it is when someone points out a flaw in the end product.

I enjoy making music and take my time to do everything until it is 'perfect.'

I've often hesitated in beginning a project because I've thought, 'It'll never turn out to be even remotely like the good idea I have as I start.' I could just 'feel' how good it could be. but I decided that, for the present, I would create the best way I know how and accept the ambiguities.

Creativity is often blocked by trying to be perfect. Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.

If you set your bar at 'amazing' it's awfully difficult to start. Your first paragraph, sketch, formula, sample or concept isn't going to be amazing. Your tenth one might not be either. Confronted with the gap between your vision of perfect and the reality of what you've created, the easiest path is no path. Shrug. Admit defeat. Hit delete. One more reason to follow someone else and wait for instructions. Of course, the only path to amazing runs directly through not-yet-amazing. But not-yet-amazing is a great place to start, because that's where you are.

At times failure is very necessary for the artist. It reminds him that failure is not the ultimate disaster. And this reminder liberates him from the mean fussing of perfectionism.

I don't really analyze my process. I do know that if it's not right, I won't move on. I'm tenacious to a fault about that.

What I've learned from sketch is you can get it as perfect as you want, and it's never going to be perfect.

To be honest, making albums is really never easy. It's always a bit excruciating because there's always this fight to make it great, and then you hit these stumbling blocks along the way.

Part of creating is understanding that there is always more to do; nothing is ever completely finished.

If you give yourself too much time, you kind of over-obsess about the music. It's not supposed to be like that.

You write a hit the same way you write a flop.