I believe that music is another form of news. Music is another form of journalism to me so I have to cover all the areas with my album.
I feel that contemporary music, with very few exceptions, is missing the voice. You see an award show, you see a hundred extras on set dancing and special effects, and you don't see that solo voice that was the trademark of Adele. It's no accident that it was her album that ended up selling 27 million copies worldwide.
And the White Album is important to me for different reasons. One - I had left the band on the White Album.
I never really made a full album in Los Angeles before.
Even though there are some great keyboard players on the album, there are a number of songs with no keyboard on them and the backing is all guitar oriented. This is first time I've ever done this actually.
Sometimes with artists, I want to hear a few things before I buy the whole album.
I met The Beatles and Stones at the same time, because Michael Cooper was doing several of their album covers.
A circumstance that I was dealing with when recording my second album was I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
I mean whatever I do it's important that I put my stamp on it and keep it in my world, whether I'm doing a dance track or something like the Russian album for example.
When you're on your fifth album, you are going to be judged against all your previous work and expectations.
An album is such a personal thing. It's something I always wanted to do. It's me doing me, singing as me.
I continue to believe, contrary to the given wisdom, that it's more interesting to have an album - or, indeed, an individual song - which has variety rather than homogeneity.
I feel like I introduce another level of my creative ability on every album.
All of these reissues were not authorized by me, I do not endorse them, the live album was put out without my permission, and I've not seen a dime at this point, either.
When we finish this tour we are going to begin writing and go into the studio to hopefully have a brand new Foreigner album out in early spring next year. This will be the first Foreigner album out in about ten years.
I think there's definitely a dance album or at least single in me somewhere. I would want to work with a really cool Ibiza DJ, though.
We'll only be playing four new songs live, but all the material for the next album is basically finished.
Some people are attracted to vulnerability. From my very first album, I've been vulnerable. I've always given parts of me, parts of my life - good, bad, ugly. I've never put up this image as a super-thug. Also, some people just like the music.
I don't want the big flashing lights and red carpet, like, 'Here comes another Bon Iver album!' I just want it to be my bedroom-y thing. But that'll take a while to figure out.
It was so simple in the old days. You put out an album, people promoted it, it got in the charts, and you had a hit.
The idea to do the album only on keyboards kind of happened by accident. I was quite happy with the sound and felt it really didn't need more instruments, so I didn't use them.
What's the point of re-releasing an album? The original sounded good, why change something about it?
But when our first album came out, I didn't think it was going to sell a lot of records.
I got to see Jack White. I love his new album. There's a song on the album called 'I Think I Should Go to Sleep' that my son loves. We play it on a loop around the house, and he just bounces around.
My African heritage is a part of reggae music roots, and the concept is that the album, 'Revelation Part 1: The Root of Life' is a tribute to roots reggae music. The fruit is what blossoms into different colors and shades, but the root has to stand predominant.
There's a misconception in my opinion... and it's that we Latinos have to go do an American album, an English album, an Anglo production, to cross over.
My joke, which isn't really a joke, is that there will be one of two tours: the tour for the album that does well, or the tour for the album that stiffs.
I'm working on my new album right now. Hopefully to get that out at the top of 2005, January 2005.
I make up cassettes all the time - to take on the road with me - a song from this album, a song from that album. That's the way I listen to music; it's like one of those K Tel things: it's from all over. I listen to Fred Astaire, I listen to African folk music, I listen to Talking Heads.
I want to make an album my grandma and my fans are going to like. I want to make my grandma understand a drop and make club fans understand a song.
I'm so embarrassed by that album. I don't even own it myself.
But for the first time, we haven't made a huge leap forward in sound from our last album. Fans who own Kid A should be able to get their heads around it.
One of the album's songs features Mary J. Blige, but I don't want to talk too much about it yet. I think you will hear the music that's been playing in my head when it comes out.
But the approach to recording this album was kind of an organized, chaotic approach where I wanted to maintain and preserve that wild abandon to creating.
When you work on an album for three and a half years, you're kind of ready for it to get out there. To have your songs reach people.
I've always wanted to produce a whole album for an artist.