“There used to be rather serious firewalls between the artist and the b...” — Jonathan Franzen Quote

There used to be rather serious firewalls between the artist and the buying public - the gallery, the publisher. And technology demolishes that wall and basically says, 'Self-promote or die.' And that is a bad head for any sort of artist to be forced into.

I was unwise enough to actually mention this in public a few times, and in fact to point out that there were two versions of the book now. One of them had somebody else's name on the cover, one had my name on the cover.

The Mekons were kind of like the background music of my life.

When I finally gave up any hope of doing anything representative of the American family, I actually seemed to have tapped into other people's weirdness in that way.

There's a lot of spaces that care about what kids are buying. There are a lot of spaces that care about what kids are watching. But there aren't a lot of spaces that care about what kids are saying.

I've been buying instruments and musical gear for a long time.

Make dinner with the goal of stretching it out for lunch in the back of your mind. Making more of one thing is cheaper than buying more varied ingredients for each meal.

When I graduated college, I had a fairly successful weekly club gig and was buying more studio equipment and writing my own music. I realized I didn't want to work.

Studies have found that preparing your own food is usually healthier and less expensive than buying fast food. But most people just don't have the time.