'Life During Wartime' for David Byrne at Coachella — AP interview

[0:04] i appreciate you you being here with us as i've been walking around the festival [0:09] i have seen so many t-shirts with either you on it or your band on it like when you come [0:14] into something like this and you see that energy what goes through the mind uh that [0:25] something happened in recent years and uh i'm suddenly kind of younger people younger generation [0:34] is more aware of what i do and what i've done and i don't know why that happened exactly maybe it's [0:41] just a combination of things maybe it's the stop making sense came back out a couple years ago [0:49] maybe it's streaming where you can you can listen to whatever you want you can check check things [0:55] out but you might there's no risk involved uh maybe all those things maybe it's the music i [1:02] would i would hesitate to say that that's for somebody else to say give yourself some credit [1:09] man yeah yeah so let's like somebody else will do that there are a lot of artists that have been [1:12] around the same amount of time as you are in the last of this time that wouldn't be pulling the [1:16] amount of excitement that this this has so well thank you yourself on the back okay yeah exactly [1:22] um you know this this this latest record that you've done who was the sky i'm sure is going [1:27] to be a focal point of the show tonight um you know in reading about it i saw a quote from you where [1:32] you said do i like what i'm doing and to me i read that and was like well i would hope so [1:43] you've been doing it for this long yeah um but what was the most surprising answer that you learned [1:48] from asking yourself that question ah that well i really do like what i'm doing i feel like i'm [1:57] incredibly lucky to be able to this is my job my job is what other people do for entertainment [2:06] for enjoyment but for me that's what i kind of do not all the time but a lot of the time [2:13] and i thought it's pretty nice yes yeah yes how lucky are we to be doing what we love yes it's it's [2:20] yeah it's extraordinary i feel uh i mean i work hard at what i do but there's a certain amount of luck [2:27] involved too right and talent and and yeah but it all has to happen yeah yeah do you put it down to [2:35] luck that's interesting that you say that not just luck but that but uh i know i i'm aware of [2:43] plenty of artists who i think are really talented who haven't gotten the breaks right haven't don't [2:50] have i the audience that i think they deserve and i thought that is just luck or top bad timing or [3:00] whatever but i thought they deserve to be heard some of them yeah right you know the the music has told [3:06] a story over so many years and your story has evolved and changed and the story that you choose [3:10] to tell evolves and changes how does it start for you so when you're like oh i'm going to sit down [3:16] right now and i'm going to i'm going to put out a new project it's going to have my name attached to it [3:21] it's going to be this new sound this new story where does it begin is that oh i have this idea that i [3:27] really want to get out and these words i want to tell people is it here's a new visual aesthetic that i [3:31] really enjoy where does it start uh recently in the last couple records it started with kind of two [3:37] parallel things i had word lyric ideas that i'd collected and i was in progress not finished but [3:45] ideas uh and it also had a collection of loops and i in samples and rhythm tracks that i'd made and [3:54] things like that so i thought okay let's see if i can put some of those things together and there's [3:59] sort of melody and a chorus and all that make make a song out of it uh and then i started thinking is [4:08] there is there a concept there um how do i want this record to sound how do i want to sound how uh [4:18] and if i know that who do i want to work with right all then one question the answer to one question [4:26] leads to the next question and and tells me okay what direction i'm going um yes um i mean there [4:34] was there was a point where i where i had some other songs that i was working on ended up they ended [4:44] up on the shelf i thought oh maybe i should make a record of all the a song for every moment in our [4:51] life a song about when we're born a song about when something there yeah it's when we first go to school [4:58] that's a that's a big moment first girlfriend yes first uh poor boyfriend whatever first kiss [5:04] whatever uh maybe a marriage maybe a divorce maybe a job a child having a child i thought okay you're [5:15] gonna you can make an album out of that i didn't i had a i had a couple of them i had a few of the [5:20] songs but not enough to make a record and some of it came out kind of corny what stops you like when [5:27] you have all these ideas and you're like oh this is you know this is what i'm working right now what [5:31] stops you from being like actually you know what this idea that i thought was great maybe isn't the [5:36] direction i want to hit i thought it seemed a little too it was kind of boxing me in a little too much [5:43] that i had to stick to that thing now maybe i maybe i'll come back to it and figure out how to do it [5:48] but i thought no it's not it feels like everything is being made to fit that mold rather than just [5:56] coming out the way it wants to come out yeah and i mean the last thing an artist wants is to feel [6:00] like they are forcing themselves to do something or to tell a story yeah um so you know i respect the [6:06] fact that you that you did stop when you did um do you have any creative itches that are still untapped [6:16] because i mean i look at the resume and it's pretty mighty fine there's some good stuff on there [6:22] and it is wide-ranging there you want to talk about putting yourself in a box i've never seen you in [6:27] a box i don't think a box exists for david um but is there something that you're like oh man this is [6:33] something i haven't touched i would love to get involved and put my fingers in there's probably [6:39] quite a few things not too not too long ago um i was at a friend's house and said oh let's all do [6:46] watercolors let's all try and do some watercolors came out kind of terrible that's not your talent [6:53] no i thought that is a really specific skill yeah yeah and it's one of those things it's like [6:59] i i'm sp it's kind of like jazz where you're you're kind of you've got to work while the water [7:04] is well the water's wet right and yeah if you mess it up that's it huh cool and then taking it [7:11] back to songwriting you know while the water's wet and ideas there how do you make sure that you [7:18] can get that from your brain into wherever it needs to be lyrically uh i'll either kind of use [7:25] the memo thing on the phone a little recording thing on the phone or so i used to carry around [7:31] one of those tiny tiny little tape recorders um a little bit easier from the phone because you [7:36] don't have to unlock it yes exactly you can just quickly grab it and push the button and yeah and [7:41] just say or sing whatever's coming coming into your mind um yeah i would do that stuff because i [7:47] know you will forget it you will forget it's like a dream you go i had this incredible idea i had this [7:54] incredible dream i can't remember any of it right well how much what percentage of the stuff that is [8:01] in those voice voice notes actually ends up becoming a thing uh a little bit there's a little bit um [8:08] probably uh the the song i wrote about the moisturizer that probably came from one of those things one of [8:17] the random voice notes at one in the morning you're like i've got this like yes yes can you turn your [8:23] brain off like can you stop creating when you feel like you need to or is it just kind of an endless [8:30] stream of idea idea idea idea um i feel like things are always kind of churning a little bit but i'm not [8:41] aware of it all the time um last couple of days the band and i was we were staying in joshua tree sir went [8:51] hiking in joshua tree which is incredible and uh i was not i was not going i have an idea for a song [9:01] it was not going on but i do feel like when you kind of clear your head out and when you're in a [9:08] situation like that you things are go things are still going on that you're not aware of it's kind [9:15] of like your your brain is sorting through things and sifting through it and then when you have that [9:21] kind of rest and that yeah that that moment then when you do sit down to do something it's like oh there [9:27] is the there's the answer to that right puzzle or the problem that i have do you feel like then that you [9:34] create better when you're in a situation and you're writing about the situation as it's happening [9:39] or when you're reflecting on it oh i have an idea i don't know if i'm right i have an idea that um [9:51] you can't write a sad song when you're sad you have is that right you remember but i think you remember [9:58] being sad interesting but you have to have enough confidence in yourself that you can write a song [10:07] that tells that story so you're basically kind of dredging it back up but at that moment you're [10:12] feeling like yeah i can i can make something good out of this you feel confident wow that's that's so [10:19] interesting man i mean you are a walking instrument um you embody music wherever you go because as i say [10:32] you are an instrument does the mood affect how the instrument plays if you wake up one day it's not your [10:39] best day does your instrument perform differently as opposed to like oh today's the best day of my life [10:46] you know what i mean hmm yeah probably yeah probably i think i'm feeling if i'm feeling good [10:54] good feeling confident about myself then then the challenge is sit down while you're while you're [11:01] feeling this way and make something out of it yeah yeah um that's so interesting and i mean you know [11:09] taking it back to this record who was the sky i mean we've spoken a lot about the creative process how the [11:14] process how the mind works but is there a feeling that you have when you know that a song is the one [11:21] you know you put something out there it's gonna live there it's part of the story it's part of your [11:25] journey is there a physical feeling that you feel when you know that this song is right it's working [11:35] uh i've had that feeling where oh this this this came together this worked out really well this one [11:43] this one really worked out um sometimes i'm sometimes i don't realize it uh i remember i thought [11:56] burning down the house was a good track but i had no idea it was going to be a good single um that [12:05] radio started playing it on a radio was a thing then um and yeah so i think sometimes i can't i can't [12:15] predict it'll surprise you sometimes what people pick up on yes surprises me and sometimes it's a really [12:22] nice surprise sometimes they pick something we go oh you picked that one right yeah wow that's so [12:30] interesting because you've got you've had a few of those moments um you know you're going to get on [12:36] stage in a couple of hours um and you're going to be singing the old the new songs take on different [12:45] meanings over time right words that you wrote x amount of years ago might mean something to you [12:52] differently now you might not be in the head space that you were in when you wrote those songs [12:58] um how do you balance that and how do you make sure that when you are performing a song that maybe [13:03] you're not there anymore you're still able to give it what the crowd wants uh there's enough songs that [13:12] i can kind of cherry pick something go i think i can do that and make it relevant and make it feel [13:21] relevant to me and relevant to the audience about so it has some meaning for the times we live in [13:27] what everyone's going through uh not every song i think fits that but i think i have enough that i can [13:34] pick stuff yes um there's definitely somewhere i go that is that i don't know where that's gonna [13:42] maybe someday in the future i'll find a place for that but there's some that kind of yeah fall by the [13:48] wayside um okay yeah not sure what else does creating a set list for something like this [13:55] differ from maybe a normal show of yours oh yeah yeah yeah yeah there's a festival set list it's shorter [14:02] um than we would normally do in our normal shows and um it's a little bit more uh up-tempo stuff [14:14] then then we might have one on a normal show um because it's it's a festival crowd it's a festival [14:23] crowd and then you want you want to kind of the audience wants to dance and have a good time and [14:28] they're not ready to sit sit down and yeah right who do you see when you look out what do you see do [14:34] you see a hundred thousand people do you see are you singing to a singular person like what are you [14:40] looking at i can see the folks in the front you can see their faces obviously if they're enjoying [14:50] it that's great but i also know don't play just to them because then the people further back are [14:57] going to feel like hey hey we're here too yeah we came here too and there's a lot more of us right [15:02] well how do you make it direct your attention out rather than down how do you make it intimate when [15:10] there are 50 100 000 people how do you find the intimacy because you could very much get lost in [15:16] that number uh i just try and try and be real and try and be myself and sometimes that works [15:31] i am so excited to see the set but nice to meet you man that was a really lovely conversation i [15:36] appreciate it thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you very much