That's what I used to enjoy so much: Bringing a record home, having it arrive in the mailbox. Having the whole experience of hearing it as you're holding it and looking at it and reading the liner notes, if they're anything.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The beauty of it is when you can just show up and hit the notes.
If you're famous and supposedly wise, it's always a good idea to have a tape recorder in the room. Never can tell when you might spew out a line or two worth printing somewhere.
I like to present something that the people haven't seen or haven't heard before. Otherwise they might as well just stay home and play the record.
One of my favorite things to do is sit around and listen to old records... You're forced to listen to the whole thing. And it's so cool digging through the bins trying to find them. I get giddy about records.
So I use a tape recorder a lot to record ideas.
I get like a melody that comes up and I try to write it down or record it. Hum it into a tape recorder or write it down on some manuscript paper. It could happen at any time, on the road or off the road, but mostly, you know, at home.
Sometimes you make a record that is what you want to hear. I've made a couple of those, idealized creations of what I wanted to hear. Then there are records that are what you feel.
I think recordings have been a terrific advance because now, when you have a piece of music, particularly something that appears to the listener very complicated, there's really a push to the world to try to figure out what it was that he was hearing.
In the past 3-4 years I've developed a habit of keeping numerous small cassette recorders in my house and in a bag with me so that I'm able to commit to tape memory song ideas on a constant basis.
It's such a relief for me to sit in front of a tape recorder and not be using it to learn my lines.