194 Quotes by Stephen Malkmus

Like the song “Stereo”, to me that’s like, kind of hip-hop in that slacker way. There’s some slackerisms mixed in with that stuff, but it wasn’t really conscious, I guess. When things would get more typical rock’n’roll that was my fallback to go to those kind of lyrics instead of the alternatives.

My wife says that I changed people’s lives or ways of thinking and that I should always be proud and grateful. If I’m dismissive of what we do sometimes, a little bit, she’s like, “I was a fan, you changed my life,” or whatever. That’s what she says.

I don’t even think my voice is really good.

There’s no reason to stop. Who knows what’s around the bend? To participate, meet new people. It’s mostly other musicians and people like you, or anybody I meet who’s in this, that keeps me going.

With some songs, I have written narratives or I’ve tried to carry it through, but generally the things that were more genius, as far as I was concerned, were not that.

I’ve lost my writing skills since college. I couldn’t write a book. It would take a long time.

I don’t really know where the songs are coming from often. Many of the best things I made up were just off the top of my head.

I don’t know if you look back on your life and just see successes, but probably the first things that pop up are the regrets.

I like a narrative, even if it’s fractured, or kind of psychedelic. But my favorite thing is if I hear words and I close my eyes and the connotations or the image I get in my head, combine with the sound of them – sometimes phonetics. I’m just stringing those together.