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I’m starting to relate more to the late-period Kerouac stuff in the way that I once related to the fun and excitement of the early material. There’s a darkness inside of me that I’m only now starting to come to grips with and accept. And it’s starting to scare me.

Ben Gibbard

There were a lot of fences and walls existing in my life, literally and figuratively, and that was really not indicative of the kind of person that I’d always been. So, when I moved back to Seattle, the first thing I said was, “I will never live in fear again.”
BEN GIBBARD

Firsts Kind Wall
I think sometimes a narrative can come out of a single word.
BEN GIBBARD

Narrative Sometimes Thinking
I don’t spend my time perusing message boards to find out what people think about me or if people think my songs are good or if people love that lyric or this or that. I just want to be happy with it myself – and if other people like it, that’s great.
BEN GIBBARD

People Song Thinking
I’m a war of head versus heart, it’s always this way. My head is weak, my heart always speaks, before I know what it will say.
BEN GIBBARD

Heart Love War
There’s a cinematic quality that happens in my mind when I hear something that really lands. An album is just a journal of a life moving through time.
BEN GIBBARD

Land Mind Moving
Now that we have the resources, we’re like, “Oh wow, a nice studio is pretty nice! They do have nice outboards here. It’s actually a pretty good place.” It’s funny how much changes so quickly.
BEN GIBBARD

Change Outboard Quickly
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.”
BEN GIBBARD

Bedroom Capacity People Realization Some
I couldn’t wait to go on tour back then. I would be sitting at my day job or my apartment, just itching to go. There were so many adventures that were about to happen.
BEN GIBBARD

Adventure Apartment Back Happen Tour
We were not goofing around anymore. We all threw everything we had into this in a way where we all found ourselves really far from home, and we were stuck with each other.
BEN GIBBARD

Anymore Each Other Goofing Ourselves
I don’t want to be overdramatic about it, but I’m starting to see a lot of my bad habits get the best of me.
BEN GIBBARD

Habit Starting Want
The late ’90s were a really bad time for people trying to be rock stars, you know what I mean? It seemed like everyone was a one-hit wonder on the radio.
BEN GIBBARD

Ambition Country Mean
I want so badly to believe that there is truth, that love is real. And I want life in every word to the extent that it’s absurd.
BEN GIBBARD

Believe Love Real
I feel like on those older records there are a lot of attempts at clever turns of phrase.
BEN GIBBARD

Attempts Clever Older Record The Phrase
Bands who are in their early 20s today, they are living in their own time and they have a series of parameters they have to work around.
BEN GIBBARD

Advice Giving Real
We always idealize the past because we don’t feel the painful stuff the way we used to.
BEN GIBBARD

Feel Idealize Painful Way
The Photo Album is the weakest record. For the first time in our careers, we found ourselves with an economic incentive to be on the road and to be making albums.
BEN GIBBARD

Cutting Home Real
The second ‘Postal Service’ album is threatening to become the ‘Chinese Democracy’ of indie rock. It will come out eventually, or maybe it won’t.
BEN GIBBARD

Chinese Indie Rock Rocks
I’ve covered Avril Lavigne. I like good pop songs, and I don’t think there should be any kind of preconceptions about where good pop songs come from.
BEN GIBBARD

Kind Song Thinking
A lot of the material is about the inevitable disappointment people feel as they move through life, and things don’t feel the way they expect. No experience will ever match up to the idealized version in your mind.
BEN GIBBARD

Disappointment Moving People
If there is one thing I think I have accomplished, it’s that I always thought of myself as a very literal songwriter, and as I look at some of those older records.
BEN GIBBARD

Clever Distance Song
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.
BEN GIBBARD

Hear Remember Room Smell Weird Wonder
The story of our band is that we were this relentless touring band in those early years. We were leaving day jobs and going off on the road and having fun and seeing the country for the first time.
BEN GIBBARD

Adventure Country Fun
We had friends who had a hit single on the radio and sold 500,000 records, and then they couldn’t get arrested a year later.
BEN GIBBARD

Friend Later Records Single Sold
An ex-girlfriend once got upset when I told her that music is the most important thing in my life. It’s more important than anyone else could ever be.
BEN GIBBARD

Girlfriend People Upset
I don’t want to be overly dramatic and say it’s the only thing that gets me up and keeps me going. But people in your life come and go.
BEN GIBBARD

Come Going Keep People
To set the record straight for the God knows millionth time, we certainly didnt sign to Atlantic just for the money.
BEN GIBBARD

God Knows Money Records
I don’t hear it now the way I did when I was 20. I think it is undeniable that the songs have become more instantaneously descriptive and literal.
BEN GIBBARD

Descriptive Life Literal Now Undeniable

I’m starting to relate more to the late-period Kerouac stuff in the way that I once related to the fun and excitement of the early material. There’s a darkness inside of me that I’m only now starting to come to grips with and accept. And it’s starting to scare me.

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I’m starting to relate more to the late-period Kerouac stuff in the way that I once related to the fun and excitement of the early material. There’s a darkness inside of me that I’m only now starting to come to grips with and accept. And it’s starting to scare me.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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