I've not really spent much time in proper studios. The room itself where you're recording, and how you live while you're there is what appeals to me.
Most people don't take some things into consideration. When they hear an album, they hear the artist or they hear the lyric or they hear the melody. But they don't really think about the environment in which it was recorded, which is so important. It's that thing that determines what the album sounds like.
The thing with R Kelly was, he liked to record late at night, around midnight. And what was different with his studio was that one room had a recording suite, and next door was a club, with 40 or 50 people dancing.
Where you record is very important. It can't be too nice, it can't be too expensive, it can't have a view to an ocean or a field.
When I record music I like to be in one place and kind of have a base to keep going back to.
In some of the greatest recordings ever made, the performance is a part of the recording. Dylan's 'Rainy Day Women No. 12 and 35' is all about the esthetic of that performance. You can hear the room.
I think a lot of the fun of making records, for me, is making each one of them a situation. For example, with 'Ghost,' I found a group of people that had an energy together, and we kind of did it in a cabin somewhere.
I love being able to record in a room that's surrounded by trees.
I don't like recording studios - except my own, which is just a little room above the garage.
I just don't like my voice in the studio, and I just don't like the studio, I'm not a studio-head. And that's why you don't get so much material from me.
Recording studios are interesting; a lot of people say - and I agree - that you should have a lot of wood in a recording studio. It gets a kind of a sweeter sound.
In my opinion, I would still like to go into a studio - because I love the environment of being in a studio - and record a great album beginning to end, but then maybe not release it as an album. Maybe put singles out there, put songs out there - either give some away or release some the traditional way.
There are artists that actually don't like going into the studio. They get mad when people say they've got a session. I'm just the opposite. I actually enjoy it.
I prefer playing in the studio because you have much more control over things.
When you're playing in front of people, everything is external. It's all going from you out to an audience. When you're in a studio, it's very internalised, it's going from the air through you into this meticulously crafted, layered piece of work.
Often, people ask if it's different doing live-action and voice-over, but the only thing that's different, really, is that we're in a booth and there's no camera on me. But, my intention, as an actor, is exactly the same.
I visit studios. Just to get the feel, the smell, and see what other people are doing. Not only listening to the radio, but going to studios, greeting musicians and artists, just getting a vibe.
You live in a bubble, generally, when you're touring and recording - you're in confined - in alone space, wherever you are, in the dressing room or in the studio - so sometimes it's hard to grasp that bigger picture of things that are going on.
I moved my studio to Palm Springs 'cause I don't like the idea of going to a studio every day like a job... I need to make a personal record, so I need to be in a house... I don't want to be in a studio where people can hear the music 'cause I don't know what it is yet.
I hate studios; I'll be honest with you. People get weird in the studio. I've had some great and terrible times with people. People's personalities come out in the worst way.
Coming from Ruff Ryders, there would be, like, 30 guys in the studio at once, and then me, trying to do my own thing.
I think there are ways a place can sneak its way into a song, or a feeling that you take into the studio.
People want to hear clean sounds; they don't want to hear coughing in the background, pages turning.
All my writing, I always do it in the studio, 'cause everything sounds good. The piano's there, the keyboards; if you want to put strings on something... And everything sounds good when it's in the cans; it sounds killer.
When you're not in studios, you don't have any luxuries; you can't control the elements, so you have to put up with those extremes.
