David Byrne

David Byrne

40 quotes

An American musician active since the 1950s, David Byrne has long been a source of memorable observations. Whether reflecting on Music or Car, David Byrne brought uncommon clarity to every subject. Our collection holds 47 quotes from David Byrne, each offering a different angle on Music, Car, Home, Business, and Trust. Start here and see if you agree: "It seems almost backwards to me that my music seems the more emotional outlet, and the art stuff seems more about ideas."

“Yeah, anybody can go in with two turntables and a microphone or a home studio sampler and a little cassette deck or whatever and make records in their bedrooms.”

— David Byrne

Home

All Quotes by David Byrne

“I've rarely kept my distance from kind of - I don't know if we can call it politics, but kind of, civic engagement and that kind of thing, except I tended to think, 'Well, do it yourself before you start telling other people what they should be doing.'”

— David Byrne

Politics

“There's more good music being made now than ever before.”

— David Byrne

Music

“Sometimes it's a form of love just to talk to somebody that you have nothing in common with and still be fascinated by their presence.”

— David Byrne

Love

“The making of music is profoundly affected by the market.”

— David Byrne

Music

“We tend to mistake music for the physical object.”

— David Byrne

Music

“You create a community with music, not just at concerts but by talking about it with your friends.”

— David Byrne

Music

“Ninety percent of all music is always crap, and when too many people decide they're going to have guitar bands, then ninety percent of them are going to be crap. It's just a given law.”

— David Byrne

Music

“It's a fundamental, social attitude that the 1% supports symphonies and operas and doesn't support Johnny learning to program hip-hop beats. When I put it like that, it sounds like, 'Well, yeah,' but you start to think, 'Why not, though?' What makes one more valuable than another?”

— David Byrne

Attitude

“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

Music

“I read the NY Times but I don't trust all of it.”

— David Byrne

Trust

“Yeah, anybody can go in with two turntables and a microphone or a home studio sampler and a little cassette deck or whatever and make records in their bedrooms.”

— David Byrne

Home

“We don't make music - it makes us.”

— David Byrne

Music

“I try to devote my afternoons to making music in my home studio, but it's a lot more fun hanging out with musicians and friends, and trying subtly to influence a band than making your own stuff.”

— David Byrne

Home

“You can know or not know how a car runs and still enjoy riding in a car.”

— David Byrne

Car

“To some extent I happily don't know what I'm doing. I feel that it's an artist's responsibility to trust that.”

— David Byrne

Trust

“My favorite time of day is to get up and eat leftovers from dinner, especially spicy food.”

— David Byrne

Food

“Real beauty knocks you a little bit off kilter.”

— David Byrne

Beauty

“I do seem to like to combine the dramatic emotional warmth of strings with the grooves and body business of drums and bass.”

— David Byrne

Business

“The true face of smoking is disease, death and horror - not the glamour and sophistication the pushers in the tobacco industry try to portray.”

— David Byrne

Death

“So there's no guarantee if you like the music you will empathize with the culture and the people who made it. It doesn't necessarily happen. I think it can, but it doesn't necessarily happen. Which is kind of a shame.”

— David Byrne

Music