When the ideas are coming, I don't stop until the ideas stop because that train doesn't come along all the time.
The best way is always to stop when you are going good and when you know what will happen next. If you do that every day when you are writing a novel you will never be stuck. That is the most valuable thing I can tell you so try to remember it.
'Hell Freezes Over' happened, and the Eagles decided to get back to work. We've toured pretty much since then, and I've been around the world a couple times. I had never really gotten any momentum going in a solo project during that period of time - Eagles was pretty much a full time job.
Once I've finished a film I just want to get on and make another one.
I feel like Court Yard Hounds keeps us idling. I think Emily and I function better when we're continually making music and playing, and this is a way to keep doing that.
My inspiration is endless; I can't define it. It is a constant flow and evolution. In general, I'm taking it from everywhere. People get nervous when they walk with me, as I'll see something and suddenly have to text it to myself.
What I love about the creative process, and this may sound naive, but it is this idea that one day there is no idea, and no solution, but the next day there is an idea. I find that incredibly exciting and conceptually actually remarkable.
When I was done with the movie [Ordinary World], I felt really compelled to start working on another album. Little did I know, they were going to come out back to back.
I never know when a record is finished until it's almost finished.
I've gone seventy-nine hours without sleep, creating. When that flow is going, it's almost like a high. You don't want it to stop. You don't want to go to sleep for fear of missing something.
I write whenever it suits me. During a creative period I write every day; a novel should not be interrupted. When I cease to be carried along, when I no longer feel as though I were taking down dictation, I stop.
It's hard to regulate the speed at which you can achieve something creative and emotional.
When I'm writing, I generally toy with an idea until it manifests itself - meaning a phrase or a tune comes into my head and eventually begins to jell. When something hits me, I write it down immediately. I don't wait, or it's gone.
Basically, a band's first record is them coming together and really learning everything, and then, after they're on the road and really become a unit, the next record slams.
The momentum of production keeps you from giving up, so it's really the editing and writing phases where things can look bleakest.
There is no perfect time to write. There is only now.
I think good artists know when they're on a roll, and they recognize when lightning is striking. It's a very fortunate thing to have that inspiration and not to overanalyze it or mess with it; you just follow it if you love what you do.
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.
I have, like, 'Finders Keepers' fever now! Sometimes I go in the studio, and I'm like, 'That worked so well, and I wrote it in 45 minutes, so if I try wearing the same outfit and playing on the same piano, it'll happen again.'
I seem to belong to a boom moment of playwrights, and I'm always curious about how we all got here and what comes next.
It takes me probably about four hours to get into the groove [with making music]. And it's really important for me to not break the groove.
I think at a certain point the book develops a certain weight, or pressure. You've been pushing the rock up the hill for a long time and then it starts to roll and things do start to come together in the last two thirds.
I've learnt that the muse is like an angry girlfriend. If she comes knocking you better be home because if you're not, she doesn't leave a note saying pick up after 3 P. M. from the post office. The gift she had is gone forever.
Anything that propels me to create, like [my book, Straight Walk]. It kept me inspired for almost four years.
each new poem is partly propelled by the formal energies of all the poems that have preceded it in the history of literature.
