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" When children start to speak they find their own voice by imitating the sounds around them. It would follow that bands do the same. Bands will find their own voice at some point. "
Ian MacKaye
Voice
Children
Find
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" I do feel like I have always, in my life, been inclined to be on the outside, walk a different path or something. Because of that, and increasingly over the years, my sense of distance from mainstream society or from the way culture works, I have a different kind of perception of it. "
Ian MacKaye
Life
Path
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" I'm always happy when I hear about people selling records or selling books or selling movies. It makes me proud of them. "
Ian MacKaye
Movies
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" I consider the piano my 'main' instrument and have been playing for as long as I can remember. It seems to me that I might have come up with something resembling a song as early as 4 or 5 years old. "
Ian MacKaye
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" I'm really anti-option, so computers have been my nightmare with recording. I don't want endless tracks; I want less tracks. I want decisions to be made. "
Ian MacKaye
Computers
Want
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" Basically we just created our own label, but again we just did it to document our own music and create our own thing, so the major labels were just always out of our picture, we're not interested. "
Ian MacKaye
Music
Always
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" Music is a language and different people who come along are each using that language to do something different, but all coming at it in a similar vein inasmuch as it's always community based and for the most part nonprofit. Most bands don't ever come within a mile of profit - clearly these people are not playing music to make money. "
Ian MacKaye
Always
Money
Music
" I've always been a bit of a documentarian. "
Ian MacKaye
Bit
Always
Been
" I've done thousands of interviews in my life, and it's a format that I quite enjoy, because I think of questions in interviews as an opportunity to sort of gauge my growth in a way. It gives me an idea of how I'm navigating this world that I'm in. "
Ian MacKaye
Growth
Life
Think
" I think sometimes my humor is extremely dry, and a lot of times I would say things that I thought were very funny but... I have a reputation of - people think of me as a very fundamentalist, humorless fellow. "
Ian MacKaye
Me
Thought
Humor
" Minor Threat was an important band, believe me that it was important it in my life, but it belongs to an era that no longer exists. I'm not nostalgic. I think music today is much more important, because something can be done about it. "
Ian MacKaye
Life
Me
Today
" What I find interesting as a 40-year-old is the idea of trying to be a part of a pronounced, continuing independent culture. The basic tenet of America is that you rebel and then you get real. "
Ian MacKaye
America
Find
Interesting
" I have thousands of tapes, and photos and fliers, letters, posters, artwork - basically everything that ever happened, I kept. I'm not a hoarder, though. I'm sort of a librarian. "
Ian MacKaye
Though
Letters
Everything
" An unlocked door means that, occasionally, you might get a devil come in, but a locked door means you have thousands of angels just walk by. "
Ian MacKaye
Devil
Angels
You
" When people who are songwriters say 'That's my property and if you give it away for free then I'll lose my incentive,' then, well, good riddance. "
Ian MacKaye
Lose
Good
Free
" Yeah, if someone's selling downloads and collecting money for our songs I would be unhappy about that but if they're trading it I don't mind, obviously if I make a thousand records or CDs or whatever, I like to sell a thousand. "
Ian MacKaye
Unhappy
Someone
Selling
" I don't dismiss the music that I was involved with, I don't think it was a joke, I don't think it was funny or a phase, I don't think it was just something I was doing back then, to me it was who I am. It connects all the way through. I don't distance myself from any of it. "
Ian MacKaye
I Am
Myself
Me
" Part of the way the work world works is not so much creating a separation between your work and your free time, but creating the illusion of a separation between your work and your free time. Every day is the weekend for me, which means I'm always busy. "
Ian MacKaye
Weekend
Work
World
" I feel completely fortunate to have this outlet for something I don't really feel like I have a choice in, to make music. I've got to make it. "
Ian MacKaye
Choice
Music
Like
" I never, ever had it in my mind that I wanted to be in the record industry, because I still contend that the record industry is an insidious affair. It's this terrible collision between art and commerce, and it will always be that way. "
Ian MacKaye
Will
Always
Art
" There are many things that people do happily that I can't imagine why they would do it... But I have to say that even though I am critical or judgmental of society at large, I'm not critical of people individually. We are who we are. "
Ian MacKaye
I Am
Say
Imagine
" I feel quite connected to the past, and my memory. Everything that I've ever done I can still relate to, and feel connected to it in a way. There's no part of my life that I look at and go, 'I don't recognize that person at all.' "
Ian MacKaye
Look
Memory
Feel
" I just have work to do; I just do it. "
Ian MacKaye
Just Do It
Work
Just
" Major labels didn't start showing up really until they smelled money, and that's all they're ever going to be attracted to is money-that's the business they're in- making money. "
Ian MacKaye
Up
Business
Start
" At every election, my vote goes to the candidate less likely to declare war. You're dropping hugely expensive pieces of exploding metal on a population. America deserves the president it gets, whether the country votes for them or allows their vote to be stolen, and the least we can do is to elect someone who won't do that to other people. "
Ian MacKaye
America
Election
People
" My focus is always on the day. What I've done behind me, I try to have respect for it, and keep an eye on it, and make sure it isn't abused, and obviously be thoughtful about it, because it's all real to me. I'm basically in every band I ever was in, and the songs, I still mean them all. "
Ian MacKaye
Day
Thoughtful
Respect
" My point of view is, I'm just a person, and there are times when I look at other people and think, 'My God, they spend so much time thinking about things that seem so absurd.' But I'm sure people must think the same thing about me. "
Ian MacKaye
Me
Thinking
Time
" The first time I ever recorded, which was into my boom-box, I was like, 'Wow, check that out.' It sounded great. The narcotic of it was so intense - it was pleasurable. I was like, 'You sound like a band.' Then I ended up spending the rest of my life trying to chase that initial high again. "
Ian MacKaye
Great
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You
" I work so I don't need to make rent through my songs, and I think if more people engaged with music without needing it to provide for their welfare, you're not beholden to anyone. "
Ian MacKaye
You
Work
Think
" To me, music is no joke and it's not for sale. "
Ian MacKaye
Music
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Sale
" American business at this point is really about developing an idea, making it profitable, selling it while it's profitable and then getting out or diversifying. It's just about sucking everything up. "
Ian MacKaye
American
Everything
Selling