Taylor Goldsmith Quotes

When you're in a band and there's five of you, you have to accommodate five people in every song.

The whole period has taught me that I enjoy being part of an ensemble rather than just a front man. Don't get me wrong - I enjoy that too, but I get more enjoyment out of really listening to everyone.

I write these songs and I like the idea of letting the band interpret it as they will. This band is like any band; it's not just me. This isn't just a way for me to play my songs. There are four distinct artistic voices, and they deserve to be expressed.

With Pearl Jam, everybody is so good at what they do, it's hard to get up the courage to say, 'Can I sing this part,' or, 'I want to play guitar.'

I'll come in with a string of riffs and direct the musical ideas. But you still need a band and their input to make the ideas come alive. You can't underestimate band chemistry.

It's easy to put on a Deep Purple record and say, 'That sounds great.' But why? Part of it is individual practice, but by playing together, a talent of meshing happens.

Luckily, I'm in a band with two other guys who really pull their own weight and have the skills and abilities to compensate for my weaknesses.

When I make a record with My Morning Jacket, I love what those guys do, so I don't have a need to play bass or drums or anything, because we're doing that as a unit.

In The Go-Go's, my philosophy is that I contribute whatever the song requires. I never think, 'What can I put in here to show off the latest trick that I just picked up?' What I think is, 'What's required from me as a drummer to make this a better song?'

When you start a band, you have to find people that are good, have the same sort of mindset as you musically.

Any musician in any band - for a really good band - you know your part in the band.

Whoever hired me might've just heard 'Refugee.' Well, I'm not the secret to 'Refugee.' The secret to 'Refugee' is the song. But if somebody really good calls me up to play on something because they like the way I played on 'Refugee,' then I wind up playing on another really good song.

I think getting the rest of the guys in the band to write is important.

I know when I sit with my band members and we're playing back a song that we've done, I know that they're experiencing it in a completely different way and hearing stuff that they're alerted to because the way the interpret the world is through their ears. Mine is through my eyes.

Jeff Lynne is an arranger, and I think it's probably much easier for him to go ahead and play a part himself than to try to show somebody else what he wants. But it's hard for me to say; I barely know Jeff.

My thinking musically has always been more advanced - it is difficult to get it down onto paper sometimes, even now.

That's why it's called Sebastian Bach. I mean, it's a permanent band, pretty much, but if I jam with other people, it just makes a better album, I think.

A bass player has to think and play like a bass player. A drummer has to play and think like a drummer, and stay out of the way of the vocalist. The guitar player has to respect everybody else.

I wanted to be in a band that shared ideas and were in it together.

As a jazz musician, you have individual power to create the sound. You also have a responsibility to function in the context of other people who have that power also.

For me making music is part social, part interaction, part collaboration.

I'm not a great band member; I'm more of a band leader.

When I think back now to the recording sessions, there is more improvisation than one hears. It's an ideal combination of arrangements and improvisation. Only a few people are able to listen and say what is composed and what is improvised. It's a unit.

I think it was probably down to the fact that we weren't together personally as a band. We weren't pulling in the same direction. I always feel if you're having a good time in the studio it actually comes across on the tape and that was a bit of a miserable album for us.

I like being with the band, the whole idea of playing music with them.