Paul McCartney Quotes

These days, I find I'm applying a little more patience to my process. If I look back on my work, I can see those songs I bailed on could have been better, that had those great two verses and then I kind of coasted from there. These days, if a song is giving me trouble, I put it aside and pick it up later, and keep doing that, for a year if I have to, until it takes shape.

Some things lend themselves well to songs, some things don't, and I'm learning that a lot at the moment. It's still a relatively new way of writing. It's only really the last five to 10 years that I've taken my writing seriously in this way, as something I can keep working toward. I think I feel myself much more before as simply a songwriter.

My main thing is just to keep writing. I've been doing some songwriting that's for my own record, I suppose.

My identity started developing through the songs I was writing.

I've said very openly that the first aspect of my artistry to arrive was writing. It took me a good number of years to find my voice.

I can put some chords together and maybe write a song, but I'm learning every day. And that's the fun part.

Domesticity is the enemy of art. I don't know if that's true. You can write good happy songs. So, I don't think it's necessarily happiness. But I think self-satisfaction is maybe the enemy. It's kind of better to think, "Tomorrow night I'm gonna sing it better." There is this forward effort. It feels to me right, it feels human.

Sometimes a song can take up to a year to write, and because I waited that year and waited to work on it that day, it came up that extra 50 percent.

I always thought of myself as the piano player in the band. That, I suppose, I'm confident about, and I guess my songwriting developed as I went along and I got a certain amount of confidence in that. The songs are like my kids, I'm proud of all of them for one reason or another.

You always want to write the perfect song. But no one will ever write the perfect song, I guess. I would just like to write on that has all the elements of what I'm tring to do. And I'm working on it. I'm always working on it.

My friend advised me to go into studying art, which at first shocked me because art was so easy. It was just something I did, like breathing or brushing my teeth. It couldn't be a job. I had a much more difficult time writing plays, making myself sit at that typewriter and finish those things.

When I listen to Airplanes record, it takes me back. I remember a lot of my thought processes when I was 20 or 21, writing those songs and recording that record. I wonder what I was thinking when I was trying to say a particular thing. I hear some of the weird little nuances in the recording; I can hear what the room sounded like. I remember what it smelled like. I can remember sitting up in guitarist Chris Walla's bedroom and for the first time in my life having this realization like, "Maybe I can do this. Maybe I can make music that in some capacity people will enjoy and come see me play."

Writing every song is a little journey. The first note has to lift you.

Writing songs does not get any easier, and that might be because I am harder on myself than I was twenty years ago. Hopefully, as we grow older and change, there are fresh topics, new perspectives, or at least there should be.

Writers have to keep on writing if they want to mature, like caterpillars endlessly chewing on leaves.

Writing a song doesn't heal things. Even if the song comes up with a solution, it's still only a theory. Going out and living my lyrics is a whole other deal. That takes courage.

I thought of myself as a writer for years before I got around to writing anything.

My favorite process is writing, from day one. The songs I have written throughout the years were a real great opportunity for me to communicate, because I think tha'ts my prime objective on this planet.

But my favorite work is always my next piece.

I started writing songs, I guess, when I was about 13 or 14, but I didn't know if they were good enough yet or anything.

Right now, my focus is really acting and directing. But I see the creativity and the work that goes into building a network, and it's fascinating to me. If those doors open for me... I think just learning as much as I can at this point is really what it's about.

I've always loved both writing and songwriting. The journey is fascinating to me.

As an artist, you keep learning. You draw out different parts of you.

I've always liked writing. Even when I was in art school and thought I was going to be a gallery painter, I liked to pair my artwork with writing. And so that naturally led to drawing comics.

I feel that I am more aware of my artistry.