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For me, a song doesn’t really take flight until it has a lyric on it. …Without a lyric that I’m happy with, it could be the greatest song ever melodically or arrangement-wise, but it doesn’t have any resonance.

Ben Gibbard

I’d like the songs to be more storytelling, but also have the turns of phrase within them that would hopefully distance my writing from the pack.
BEN GIBBARD

Distance Hopefully Song Storytelling
I don’t think I was doing anything poorly at that time, but I can certainly see how my writing has changed.
BEN GIBBARD

Certainly Changed Think
Hall & Oates is one of the few musical groups as satisfying now as it was back then. There’s something incredibly musically satisfying about their songs. Nothing has diminished my love for them.
BEN GIBBARD

Group Musical Song
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
I’m not like a 90-mph fastball kind of guy, but I can hit 70 on radar gun.
BEN GIBBARD

Baseball Gun Player
At this point in my life, I find myself obsessed with alternate paths I could’ve taken. I don’t think about this with a sense of regret, but with a sense of wonder.
BEN GIBBARD

Regret Taken Thinking
Because of my age and what I do for a living and the amount of time that I’ve spent away from my family and loved ones.
BEN GIBBARD

Age Darkness Fun
I like writing on piano and a computer, and a lot of ‘Plans’ came out of samples and vocal lines.
BEN GIBBARD

Lines Piano Writing
I think sometimes a narrative can come out of a single word.
BEN GIBBARD

Narrative Sometimes Thinking
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

Darkness Early Inside Material
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
You remember that stuff and laugh about it now. You don’t feel it the way you did back then when you were so scared and nervous and tired and hungry.
BEN GIBBARD

Back Hungry Laugh Nervous Remember Tired
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’ve always had a soft spot for Phil Collins. He’s a great vocalist.
BEN GIBBARD

Great Spots Vocalist
The songwriting of Hall & Oates is deceptively complex. There are a number of key changes that pass you by as you’re listening to the song because they’re so seamless and clever.
BEN GIBBARD

Clever Numbers Song
I want to write songs with complete sentences. I almos have this obsession with short-changing words. I would never be so pretentious to say that my lyrics are poetry. … Poems are poems. Song lyrics are for songs.
BEN GIBBARD

Song Want Writing

For me, a song doesn’t really take flight until it has a lyric on it. …Without a lyric that I’m happy with, it could be the greatest song ever melodically or arrangement-wise, but it doesn’t have any resonance.

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For me, a song doesn’t really take flight until it has a lyric on it. …Without a lyric that I’m happy with, it could be the greatest song ever melodically or arrangement-wise, but it doesn’t have any resonance.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Ben Gibbard Quotes