When you hear composer, you think, like, Beethoven: guy in a powdered wig, at a piano, furiously scribbling on manuscript paper. That's not the only image that a composer should bring up, you know. But that's kind of what we've said it is.
Chris Martin looks like a geography teacher.
If you play acoustic guitar you're the depressed, sensitive guy.
I think we choose gear by the way that it looks. We choose lots of things by the way that it looks. I don't like bands that look like roadies. I don't like when I can't tell who's the guitar tech and who's the guitar player.
There's a persona that musicians carry with them. I like to find what's under the persona.
We've got the pretty-boy lead singer and the fat, dumpy drummer, and I'm the zany guitarist. Sure, we've played up the image at times. But it's the music that matters most.
Eric Clapton always wanted to come out onstage with a stuffed parrot on his shoulder.
I still want to play music but I don't want to look like Donald Duck while I'm doing it.
I always loved the look of musicians. I've always admired them because they have a look - when I was growing up, it seemed that the ones I liked didn't need to have a stylist. Now there is this trend where everyone has a stylist, or follows the suggestions of a stylist, from designers on down.
I never minded being thought of as a pop star. People have always thought I wanted to be seen as a serious musician, but I didn't, I just wanted people to know that I was absolutely serious about pop music.
I feel like now if you're going to start a band you have to have an Instagram full of yourself looking a certain way, lined up like five dudes in mugshot alley, hanging out by the bridge or up against the wall, or "We're in a library for some reason!"
I don't think I have an image of being an underground musician. I have an image of being an uncompromising musician, and I am well known in Norway partly because of that.
Beethoven had a great look. It was very much about the drama of appearance.
I never tried to emulate The Beatles, and I never really wanted to be like The Rolling Stones. I never really felt that I had the look or the demeanor of veteran musicians.
Stereotyping and generating brands around musicians I think contributes to their eventual demise.
I always loved the look of musicians. I've always admired them because they have a look - when I was growing up, it seemed that the ones I liked didn't need to have a stylist.
