Elliott Smith Quotes

Playing things too safe is the most popular way to fail.

I don't really like New York better than Portland. It's just a different place.

But I was also doing odd jobs around Portland, like spreading gravel and transplanting bamboo trees.

Theres a bunch of Elvis Costello records that made all the difference between feeling like a total freak and feeling like ... only a freak. A freak among other freaks

I didn't have a hard time making it. I had a hard time letting it go.

Everything means nothing to me

I truly hope the future will bring me something to feel nostalgic about, because there's really nothing much so far I can remember fondly.

Somewhere where people aren't so mad would be nice, but I don't know if there is anywhere like that.

Music is worth doing just because. It doesn’t have to be justified by some political point of view, and it’s kind of insulting to the music to make it a tool for something else.

Haven't laughed this hard in a long time. I better stop now before I start crying. Go off to sleep in the sunshine...I don't want to see the day when its dying.

There's always that argument to make - that you're in better company historically if people don't understand what you're doing.

I'm happy some of the time, and some of the time I'm not. But like when I see a movie, for example, that I really like, that moves me or whatever, it's usually happy and sad at the same time.

A lot of people are kind of depressed. I'm happy some of the time, and some of the time I'm not.

I mean people just have a way of - y'know they'll review your record in two sentences and put you in this little stupid box that you don't want to be in

You can't get better at things you never play.

If you play acoustic guitar you're the depressed, sensitive guy.

The devil's script sells you the heart of a blackbird.

He made his life a lie so he might never have to know anyone.

It's just that a lot of songs that are popular right now, they don't have any meaning

I think the music business will eventually crush me, but I [smiles]... I'm ready.

People can be chaos but it's hard to fit it into some creative piece that you made. It's hard.

It was kind of ridiculous to carry it up to a certain point and then drop the ball or the bomb, like quitting the band right after we had signed to Virgin.

It's a lot easier to tell the truth usually.

There are lots of things I like about playing in a band, the things I cant do by myself you know.

Doing battle with themselves that way, every day, all the time and sometimes it sucks, but other times it results in people making sort of a dream comprehensible to someone else.

They say that God makes problems just to see what you can stand, before you do as the devil pleases.

All your secret wishes could right now be coming true.

I wondered if I would talk about drug use. But I guess, why hide it?

The band's filter, but playing live is a lot of fun.

People think they know all these things about other people, and if you ask them why they think they know that, it'd be hard for them to be convincing.

I rode on a float in one of the parades in Mississippi. It's an experience.

Certain songs just feel a way that's hard to put into words and it's not happy and it's also not really sad but I couldn't say what it is

I see you're leaving me and taking up with the enemy, the cold comfort of the in-between, a little less than a human being.

So if somebody writes a song that appears to have some meaning then everybody thinks that it's a really heavy song.

Burning every bridge that I cross to find some beautiful place to get lost.

I just wanted to move out of Portland to do something.

It's hard to represent chaos, or like an absence of something. It's much easier to represent the presence of something or a situation.

My girlfriend at the time convinced me to send these songs to Cavity Search. When they wanted to put out my record I was totally shocked.

I don't really think of time off as writing blocks. I think that's a western notion of demonizing inactivity. When your imagination decides it needs to take a nap. maybe that's what it needs to do.

I watched myself put my paw in the bear trap on that one because there was this clause about leaving members

I can't think of anything off the top of my head that seems more important than something designed to raise money to keep something going that keeps IV drug users from dying.

People are so... seem so chaotic internally, but being filtered through some form, like making a record, sort of filters it down into something that can be understood.

It touches on drug use. I got caught up in that for almost two years.

I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.

I didnt know how many people knew who Ferdinand was.

I walked out and Jack Nicholson was sitting about six feet away, so I avoided that area and I looked up at the balcony in the back and sang the song.

If I seem to be reckless with myself,It's the fault of no one.All things have a placeUnder the moon as well as the sun.

Fights problems with bigger problems.

I'm just writing songs about how I feel or about how people I know feel.

Static in my head, the reflected sound of everything, tried to go to where it led, but it didn't lead to anything.