John Cusack Quotes

I've always felt that there's a point where a piece seems to be alive, that is, living. And that's the point where I know the composition is finished.

I started producing work with an ecstatic addiction.

The only reason I create something is because I'm chasing a feeling. You can use a bunch of musical or psychological operations to achieve that result.

The only thing in life that really gives me any peace is just being lost in the process of creating something, whether it's the film or painting and drawing, which has been a big part of my life, for a long time.

The creative habit is like a drug. The particular obsession changes, but the excitement, the thrill of your creation lasts.

When I have a creative insight, there is a high. I think back in the day, I made music as much as I did because it made me feel so good. I think you could argue that there is a creative addiction - but, you know, the healthy kind.

I'm always dictated to be what I want to do, and I have a love affair with every movie I've done, and some of them have turned out good, and some of them have turned out not so good. But regardless, the making of them, or that love affair, has always been a great experience.

When I'm in the studio, I'm looking for creativity I haven't matched yet, a feeling I haven't felt. It's a high.

When I create music, the feeling that you get... I get first. You [the listener] have a delayed experience with the feeling I initially get when I have a creative insight. Not just the voice, but all the creativity - the production, the idea, the concept, the music involved. There is a high. There is an emotional experience that happens when everything comes together... I made music as consistently as I did, especially back in the day, because it made me feel so good... When everything is on, it's a wonderful feeling.

Any true musician, true artist, knows that when they're in that point of total artistic creation, whether on stage or in the studio or writing or whatever, that's the closest moment [to creation]. And that's what keeps all these people addicted to getting back to that moment again.

But slowly I began to use cameras and then think about what it was that was going on. It took me a long time, I mean I actually played with cameras and photography for about 20 years.

I do think the first time you read a script, that gut response is very important, and that probably plants a seed that continues to blossom throughout the whole experience.

That terrible mood of depression of whether it's any good or not is what is known as The Artist's Reward.

And I don't have any specific steps to take because I don't start the same way every time. But there is a knowing when it's enough and you can leave it alone.

There's no greatest moment in the arts. It's a life, it's a continuity thing. You can't have a great moment because it's spiritual. It's a belief, it's a calling. If you're an artist, doing your own thing on your own, it's while you're doing it that counts. It's a process. If you get too elated, you can get too depressed.

My grandmother always used to wear this English perfume called Tuberose and then she died and then I dated this girl who wore the same thing. Every time I hung out with her, I could only think of my recently deceased grandmother. So sometimes a signature scent can be good and sometimes it can be bad.

I always go in very emotionally when I'm doing music. Sad or happy, I'm always into it. I have a hard time writing for other people, writing with someone else in mind.

Most artists work all the time, they do actually, especially good artists, they work all the time, what else is there to do? I mean you do.

If at noon you sit down and there's just silence or blank tape, in an hour if you have a song, that didn't exist an hour ago. Now it exists and it might exist for a long time. There's something empowering about that.

Every good writer or filmmaker has something eating at them, right? That they can't quite get off their back. And so your job is to make your audience care about your obsessions.

I have shared my whole life. My private and my show business life. It helps me actually to feel my songs and to go on with my dreams.

I've never experienced writer's block. When it's going really well, my body temperature goes up, and I'm flushed. I get quite delirious.

When you work on a record for three years, it's a great sense of relief when it is finally out in the world. It just feels good.

I can't sculpt. But if I were a sculptor, as you start to get something that actually looks like what you want, then it starts to be fun. That's the way I find writing.