I still love ‘The Cure’ more than almost any other band. But they were really, truly like the first band that I really loved and felt was mine, you know. At a pivotal time in my life when I was 13, 14 years old. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
I think that the wonderful thing about music and about songs is that you can listen to a three-minute song whenever you feel you need it. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
I read ‘On The Road’ in college. I was 18 or 19, and I had a particular quarter where I was taking biology, calculus, and physics. Those were my three classes. It wasn’t a well-rounded schedule at all. It was hard, hard work, all the time – hours and hours and hours of homework. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
The songwriting of Hall & Oates is deceptively complex. There are a number of key changes that pass you by as you’re listening to the song because they’re so seamless and clever. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
Hall & Oates is one of the few musical groups as satisfying now as it was back then. There’s something incredibly musically satisfying about their songs. Nothing has diminished my love for them. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
We all pine for a time in life when things were simpler. Even when they weren’t necessarily simpler, hindsight makes them look a lot simpler. The reality of it was that it wasn’t. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
I decided a handful of years ago that I just want to write songs that you can understand as soon as you put the record on. There’s no need to veil what’s happening in the song the way I used to. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
My goal as a songwriter now is to simply write some memorable turns of phrase. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
I think the narratives on ‘Trans,’ ‘Plans,’ and ‘Narrow Stairs’ moved away from the way I wrote on the first couple of records, which was a lot more impressionistic. I was writing those songs in my early 20s, so I thought I was being more clear than I actually was. Ben Gibbard Read Quote
