Style

I suppose that, in a sense, you can't escape your own style. So, in one sense that's true. But, of course, I'm always interested in something when it isn't familiar to me. So, there's a kind of edge to what you're doing, the kind of leading edge of what you're doing. Inside that edge [are elements you] are familiar with, and are probably becoming slightly bored with, as well, over a period of time. "I've pulled that one out before. Oh, no, I can't I'm just fed up with that. Let's do something else." So, there's that, and then at the edge of things, there's some new things you're starting to do and to find exciting. And you always think "Oh my God I've never done anything at all like that before." But, of course, in retrospect, and to an outsider, they'll say, "Oh, yeah that's typical Eno."

It's just like I was saying about when you look back on a historical period of music, it seems so obvious to you what the characteristics of it are, but they're not obvious at the time. So, when I look back at my own work, I could easily write a very convincing sort of account of it that made it look like I had planned it all out from day one and that this led logically to that and then I did this and then that followed quite naturally from that. But that's not how it felt. It always felt [like], "Oh God I've never done anything like this before; that's so exciting!"

Brian Eno

Boredom

Boredom - his name for the relentless enemy that has stalked him everywhere - has lessened with age, Mr Greene said. He has described, in terrible detail, the peculiar torture it once caused him. A young, and more despairing Graham Greene found his boredom so unbearable that, in 1923, he played Russian Roulette, alone, with a loaded revolver "to make the discovery that it was possible to enjoy again the visible world by risking its total loss." It was boredom too that made Mr. Greene once insist that a dentist extract a healthy tooth because he so wanted the ether that was used.

from profile of Graham Greene by Gloria Emerson, March 1978, Rolling Stone

Intention

Your intention is to express this moment when things go wrong. But what you write about is a trailer court, and a blue car in a trailer court. Yet, somehow, when people come back to talk to you, they will say, “You know I listened to that song and it reminds me of when things go wrong.” They always understand what you intended. That’s the mystical thing about songwriting to me. We’re talking on these other levels that we don’t know. And the best thing you can do as a songwriter is trust the higher part that is writing, and don’t judge yourself or worry too much about it. Yes, the wrong word or wrong phrase can impede that process, but let it be. Trust yourself; trust your journey and your life; write the song.

Rickie Lee Jones