Musician

I get mad at myself when I get news from Twitter before I get it from a regular news source. Then I'm off to a bad start: getting the second-hand, filtered experience all day long.

What I appreciate about Sleater-Kinney is that we did six records, and they all felt different. It was a band that was able to encapsulate different sensibilities because we were focusing on it as music and art and not as a statement.

Grief is sort of the allowance of feeling.

'Wii Music' elevates the scope of music video games by moving beyond commentary on what music is - as 'Rock Band' and 'Guitar Hero' do - to suggesting what it could be. Yet I'm still left wondering: Couldn't it be more?

The hedonistic lifestyle is difficult to achieve when you're still carrying your own gear. Trust me that you don't feel glamorous with a 60-pound amp in your arms; it's a lot less sexy than toting a vodka gimlet and impossible to do in heels.

One summer, when I was elementary-school age, my neighbors and I built guitars and keyboards out of scrap wood, painted them in bright colors, and formed the cover band Lil' 'D' Duran Duran. We didn't make our own noise or even pretend to play our fake instruments.

I love Joy Williams, Lorrie Moore: such great short-story writers.

From the ashes of Bauhaus, Love and Rockets transformed its grandiosity and excesses into boldness and virtuosity. Plus, it wasn't afraid of a catchy hook or two.

I was always drawn to performing. I took improv and acting classes during the summers and was involved in middle and high school plays. But when I discovered indie and punk music in high school, those things sort of took over.

I like playing someone with a certain stability at the periphery of the madness.

I'm such a big fan of 'The Bachelor.'

I think there's a lot of wonderful comics that leave you hanging in a state of apprehension or anxiety before alleviating that tension with a joke.

Shoes are a great invention. They keep us from stepping on nails. Your feet stay clean and warm and dry.

When people grow up with a family characterized by chaos and uncertainty and fragility, you look for a substitution for that.

I don't think I realized right away that I was switching from being a fan into being a performer. I've always tried to maintain that duality, because I think fandom is a way of being porous and curious, but it did feel like a step forward.

I want to have a sense of openness and optimism, even if that means being open to things that are potentially dark.

It's hard to beat the visceral high of playing live and creating something spontaneous.

I think people would describe a lot of Sleater-Kinney as unsettling. And I don't think our best moments have sonic assonance to them. I think that we are best with a little bit of... a caustic attitude and tone.

I definitely love performing live because there are moments of spontaneity. And as much as you're performing on stage, I feel like the audience is performing, too.

I think that there is something about the ritual of making things more difficult that people find meaning in.