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" The worst thing you can do as an artist is to repeat yourself. "

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" One of my favorite modern American authors is Denis Johnson. I'm deeply inspired by all of his work - I rip him off constantly. "

" I've thought about the idea of, 'Can happiness and creativity co-exist?' So much of what I've done, I think, has been based on being dissatisfied or incomplete or lonely. The answer is, 'There isn't an answer, necessarily.' "

" I'll write about myself, or people I know, or archetypal characters, but the goal is to get at some truth, not to necessarily convey my own experience as an individual to the world. "

" I think we should be pushing for amnesty and a path to citizenship for every undocumented person residing in the United States who has not committed a violent crime, with a special emphasis on keeping families together. "

" I think there are some songs that stand the test of time better than others for sure. I think some songs go out of favour; I'll get sick of a song for a while, and I won't play it; then it'll make a comeback. "

" I know a girl who cries when she practices violin because each note sounds so pure it just cuts into her, and then the melody comes pouring out her eyes. Now, to me, everything else just sounds like a lie. "

" I'm always fascinated when people really fervently believe, because I have such a hard time believing anything. When people have real faith in something, it's fascinating to me. And the fact that so many people, in surveys, so many people say they do. It kind of blows my mind. "

" A boycott is, inherently, a blunt instrument. It is an imperfect weapon, a carpet bomb, when all involved would prefer a surgical strike. "

" I think there's so much about Rasta culture that's interesting. Just the idea of preaching one-ness, that we're all in this together. "

" I remember having to quit school and quit my job. I just sort of moved all my stuff into other people's places. Within, like, six months, I was able to earn enough money from touring to rent a place again. "

" Let the poets cry themselves to sleep, and all their tearful words will turn back into steam. "

" I would prefer to be a little nervous, because when you stop being nervous is kind of when you stop caring. "

" In theory, I always think I should totally go back to school, because I don't want to start sinking slowly... I want to learn, blah blah blah. Then I think about actually going and sitting in classes and, man, it sounds terrible. "

" The way my life's structured, I don't stay in a place for more than a couple months. "

" To outsiders it probably seems like splitting hairs, but to me, Bright Eyes is a simply the collaboration between myself and Mike Mogis and Nate Walcott. What you hear is definitely the sum of all our ideas and represents all three of us. But I still write the songs myself. "

" The only thing major labels can really offer is money. "

" When I try to explain to people the big influences in my life, or at least when I first started, the most important ones were my friends who were also writing songs and were typically four or five years older than me. "

" You can only really understand good if you have bad, so the idea of heaven or anything that happens for eternity, even if it's nice, I can't imagine it being nice forever. Even the idea of forever is kind of ridiculous, which is unfortunate because it's kind of a nice thing to say, you know. "

" Art is essentially communication. It doesn't exist in a vacuum. That's why people make art, so other people can relate to it. "

" I enjoy recording and performing, but it's the songwriting that I love most. "

" When you're 16 or 17, I think like most people that age, the first time you experience certain things in life, whether it's heartbreak or death or love, obviously it's going to seem like a much bigger deal. "

" When I started writing songs, I was doing it for myself and a small circle of friends. And gradually, over the years, an audience became involved. "

" I keep my eyes closed a lot when I'm singing because sometimes it's distracting to see people. "

" They say it's better to bury your sadness in a graveyard or garden that waits for the spring to wake from its sleep and burst into green. "

" Pronouns really don't matter in a song - 'I' or 'he' or 'she' or even subscribing a lyric to an inanimate object. "

" Although Omaha is my birthplace and the place I grew up, I don't see myself spending extended amounts of time there. I feel almost more comfortable and more at peace in New York. "

" I find that moving keeps me optimistic, the idea of what's going to be down the road a bit or around the next bend. "

" I have a lot of friends that take that position of extreme cynicism, and I just can't let myself go to that place. It's just too easy, and it's just too defeatist. "

" The one recurring theme in my writing, and in my life in general, is confusion. The fact that anytime you think you really know something, you're going to find out you're wrong - that is the rule. The moments where you think you have something figured out, those are the exceptions. "

" When you write a song, the goal is not to convey the details of your life. You should write a memoir or something if that's what you're going to do. "