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Pride and Prejudice
The Great Gatsby
Hamlet
Of Mice and Men
Frankenstein

Pride and Prejudice
The Great Gatsby
Hamlet
Of Mice and Men
Frankenstein

David Byrne Quotes

The city is a body and a mind – a physical structure as well as a repository of ideas and information.

– David Byrne

There’s something about music that encourages people to want to know more about the person that made it, and where it was recorded, what year it was done, what they were listening to, and all this kind of stuff. There’s something that invites all this obsessive behavior.

– David Byrne

Cycling can be lonely, but in a good way. It gives you a moment to breathe and think, and get away from what you’re working on.

– David Byrne

I’ve noticed a lot of younger artists have less fear of doing different sorts of things, whether it’s various types of music, or gallery artists moving between video and sculpture and drawing.

– David Byrne

Yeah, it’s pretty hard not to be completely cynical these days.

– David Byrne

I came to New York to be a fine artist – that was my ambition.

– David Byrne

Before recording technology existed, you could not separate music from its social context.

– David Byrne

We tend to mistake music for the physical object.

– David Byrne

Artists are notoriously snooty and suspicious of anything coming from the business community.

– David Byrne

I’m not suggesting people abandon musical instruments and start playing their cars and apartments, but I do think the reign of music as a commodity made only by professionals might be winding down.

– David Byrne

I cycled when I was at high school, then reconnected with bikes in New York in the late ’70s. It was a good way of getting around the clubs and galleries of the Lower East Side and Soho.

– David Byrne

In a certain way, it’s the sound of the words, the inflection and the way the song is sung and the way it fits the melody and the way the syllables are on the tongue that has as much of the meaning as the actual, literal words.

– David Byrne

I think I had a mild case of Asperger’s as a younger guy, but that typically just wears off after a while. For some people, anyway.

– David Byrne

On a bike, being just slightly above pedestrian and car eye level, one gets a perfect view of the goings-on in one’s own town.

– David Byrne

From what I’ve heard, Paris did a little bit more prep work as far as making bike lanes and all of that stuff. They really did it properly, which New York is getting to little by little.

– David Byrne

The assumption is that your personal life has to be a mess to create, but how much chaos can you allow in before it takes over?

– David Byrne

I’ve never had writer’s block.

– David Byrne

I’ve been asking myself: ‘Why put together these things – CDs, albums?’ The answer I came up with is, well, sometimes it’s artistically viable. It’s not just a random collection of songs. Sometimes the songs have a common thread, even if it’s not obvious or even conscious on the artists’ part.

– David Byrne

I’ve made money, and I’ve been ripped off. I’ve had creative freedom, and I’ve been pressured to make hits. I have dealt with diva behavior from crazy musicians, and I have seen genius records by wonderful artists get completely ignored. I love music. I always will.

– David Byrne

I found music to be the therapy of choice. I guess it is for a lot of people.

– David Byrne

With music, you often don’t have to translate it. It just affects you, and you don’t know why.

– David Byrne

Why not invest in the future of music, instead of building fortresses to preserve its past?

– David Byrne

I remember talking with Arcade Fire after their first record, when they were getting all kinds of offers from major labels, and I don’t think I gave them any advice. They survived that whole onslaught pretty well anyway without me.

– David Byrne

That’s the one for my tombstone… Here lies David Byrne. Why the big suit?

– David Byrne

I can’t deny that label-support gave me a leg up – though not every successful artist needs it.

– David Byrne

I use a stream-of-consciousness approach; if you don’t censor yourself, you end up with what you’re most concerned about, but you haven’t filtered it through your conscious mind. Then you craft it.

– David Byrne

There are plenty of people who are, I think, completely racist who love hip-hop.

– David Byrne

Real beauty knocks you a little bit off kilter.

– David Byrne

The wage for most musicians is a modest amount, and that includes me some of the time.

– David Byrne

The voting booth joint is a great leveler; the whole neighborhood – rich, poor, old, young, decrepit and spunky – they all turn out in one day.

– David Byrne

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