Latest Ted Leo Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• Despite the fact that I trust the people at major labels who tell me that they want to offer me a home as a "stable artist," who can just do what he does for the long haul, time has shown that it rarely works out that way - the bottom line is the bottom line, not mention the threat of mergers and firings and whatnot, and people get dropped.

  Ted Leo

  Home, Artist, Long

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• Though I know for a fact that some of my fans would be happy for me to do anything that's going to help me be successful, namely to go to a major label, and I thank them for that, there'd be a lot of people who I think wouldn't be so happy with that change, and when I DO get dropped, then where would I be?

  Ted Leo

  Successful, Thinking, People

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• I think I'd like to see CDs disappear. Too much plastic crap lying around. If I want some music these days, I'm gonna either get as MP3s or on vinyl.

  Ted Leo

  Lying, Thinking, Vinyl

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• There are more people that are WORTH playing for and making records for than the fickle and casual - they just don't blog about what they hate as much. I feel like every show that we play live reminds me of why I play music. When you're away from that personal connection, you can get wound up in all the hoo-ha about this and that, but when you get out there and connect with people, you can't help but be moved, and that keeps you going at least until the next show!

  Ted Leo

  Hate, People, Helping

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• I am the stereo-typical classic lapsed Catholic. Religious themes crop up in my songs sometimes as metaphors and other kinds of touchstones for getting at issues and "deeper issues," and all that. Right now, honestly, I think all religion is proving itself to be a NET negative on the human race. I recognize its valuable place in individual lives and many larger communities - I know the good that is done in its various names all over the world, but I don't believe in it anymore, and I see the negative aspects dragging us down at a much faster rate than the positive ones are bouying us up.

  Ted Leo

  Song, Religious, Believe

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• My "degree" has done nothing for me at all. But that I've learned - the critical thought processes I've tried to keep sharp - these things were furthered along by college. I hated so much of my life "at university," but I also loved so much of it, and the things that I loved about it have kept me in a sort of "scholarly pursuit" to this day. Maybe it messed me up because I believe that there are things like truth and beauty, and that art and discussion can help us find them and enhance our lives.

  Ted Leo

  Art, Believe, College

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• When I started playing solo 10 years ago, I had some ham-fisted idea about trying to subvert the "singer-songwriter" tag/genre, and I tried to obscure my identity into the identity of a collective or band or whatever. That's part of the reason that I used to play with backing tapes and why so much of my early stuff was so awash in tape hiss and echo noise.

  Ted Leo

  Trying, Identity, Obscure

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• There's a lot of discussion about whether you should be a good live band or a good studio band. I think you can use the studio to make a great "studio record" and not necessarily have to reproduce exactly that on stage, but still be a great "live band." Having said that, if what you're going for is just the raw capture of your live sound, then that's cool, too - go for it! I enjoy working in the studio, though, and while I try to get near to an approximation of what's going on onstage, it's not my first priority usually.

  Ted Leo

  Thinking, Priorities, Trying

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• There's a definite machinery behind everything that a band does, and sometimes it's hard to figure out how far to go in delegating certain responsibilities and staying COMPLETELY DIY.

  Ted Leo

  Responsibility, Sometimes

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

• The obsessive documentation is itself adjacent to hyper-consumption in our society. The desire to just have everything all the time and adjacent to that is - it might be a little hokey but - a certain loss of identity that then only gets sort of found or ascribed to these moments that are documented. If so much of your experience is devoted to the thought of documentation, you're already sort of spinning out this narrative from this moment that you are attempting to control instead of just experiencing it.

  Ted Leo

  Loss, Desire, Identity

  Source: www.avclub.com

• It's almost weirder sometimes when you don't have a full life experience with someone's ups and downs, knowing what they've been through. Sometimes a loss that just comes out of left field rings in a very weird way when you have actually sort of relied on this small moment with this or that person, as a moment that actually has defined something for you in your life.

  Ted Leo

  Loss, Knowing, Small Moments

  Source: www.avclub.com

• I actually enjoy Instagram. I enjoy seeing what people who I have some connection to are doing around the globe. I'm even old-school Instagram. I'm here for your "What did you have to eat today?" I'm fine with that.

  Ted Leo

  Old School, People, Today

  Source: www.avclub.com

• If so much of your experience is devoted to the thought of documentation, you're already sort of spinning out this narrative from this moment that you are attempting to control instead of just experiencing it.

  Ted Leo

  Documentation, Narrative, Spinning

  Source: www.avclub.com

• I'm even old-school Instagram. I'm here for your "What did you have to eat today?" I'm fine with that.

  Ted Leo

  School, Today, Instagram

  Source: www.avclub.com

• The obsessive documentation is itself adjacent to hyper-consumption in our society. The desire to just have everything all the time and adjacent to that is - it might be a little hokey but - a certain loss of identity that then only gets sort of found or ascribed to these moments that are documented.

  Ted Leo

  Loss, Desire, Identity

  Source: www.avclub.com

• I actually enjoy Instagram. I enjoy seeing what people who I have some connection to are doing around the globe.

  Ted Leo

  People, Connections, Instagram

  Source: www.avclub.com

• I do feel like at the end of anger I have to have something that grounds it.

  Ted Leo

  Ends, Feels

  Source: www.avclub.com

• Some people never need to let up at all.

  Ted Leo

  People, Needs

  Source: www.avclub.com

• The early 2000s for me were a very emotional time, politically. I'd been through Reagan and been through first Bush and Clinton, and it's not like I had an easy time through those years. But I just thought it was particularly rough. I have to say the World Trade Center attack was very weird for me. The events that followed were worse. It was a really long swath of time.

  Ted Leo

  Emotional, Years, Long

  Source: www.avclub.com

• Sometimes a loss that just comes out of left field rings in a very weird way when you have actually sort of relied on this small moment with this or that person, as a moment that actually has defined something for you in your life.

  Ted Leo

  Loss, Small Moments, Way

  Source: www.avclub.com

• I gotta make a living somehow, and make ends meet. I accept the idea of having a retirement.

  Ted Leo

  Retirement, Ideas, Accepting

  "Ted Leo and Ben Arthur Discuss Carly Simon, Joyce Carl Oates, and the Touring Grind". Interview with Ben Arthur, logger.believermag.com. June 26, 2016.

• I used to think success would be sustainability. Not being behind the eight ball.

  Ted Leo

  Thinking, Eight, Would Be

  "Ted Leo and Ben Arthur Discuss Carly Simon, Joyce Carl Oates, and the Touring Grind". Interview with Ben Arthur, logger.believermag.com. June 26, 2016.

• Most of the time I wind up with a sleepily mumbled melodic line, sometimes with words, sometimes not. But then with my waking brain I have to decide whether it's worth...I mean, sometimes it's not worth it.

  Ted Leo

  Mean, Wind, Brain

  "Ted Leo and Ben Arthur Discuss Carly Simon, Joyce Carl Oates, and the Touring Grind". Interview with Ben Arthur, logger.believermag.com. June 26, 2016.

• When I get into the moment of actually feeling like I want to write, to finish something, I do what I've always read authors do, and park myself at a desk and bang things out for three hours. And if I have to throw it all away, I throw it all away.

  Ted Leo

  Writing, Feelings, Bangs

  "Ted Leo and Ben Arthur Discuss Carly Simon, Joyce Carl Oates, and the Touring Grind". Interview with Ben Arthur, logger.believermag.com. June 26, 2016.

• I know that the dream mind is irrational, but I like to think that if I hear something in a dream that's really good, then it's irrational... but it's not crazy.

  Ted Leo

  Dream, Crazy, Thinking

  "Ted Leo and Ben Arthur Discuss Carly Simon, Joyce Carl Oates, and the Touring Grind". Interview with Ben Arthur, logger.believermag.com. June 26, 2016.