August 29, 2007 1:30 AM

One of the most interesting things for me to do is observe how the music I make explores how I act out myself.

They're essentially the same thing:

An individual has an audience, real or imagined; so does a song.

Around other individuals, you want to act in ways that are comprehensible, but not just express the same trite and clich� attitudes and behaviors. In music, you want to provide familiarity, and then show how it can be turned inside out to produce something new. The most conventional meet expectations; the most exceptional upset them, with a cogent and winsome fashion. This is how you define individuality.

A lot of times, I don't think my recordings do justice to my ideas. I think this failure is because I always overestimate how much someone can hear sonically, and, by extension, my intent (if you can't hear what I'm doing, you can't hear what I intended!). I wonder if this same assumption has led to more than one social misunderstandings in my life...

One thing I'm figuring out is how to simplify and exaggerate my ideas so they fit in a recording. Less clutter, more clarity and concision. Perhaps that's also what I intend to do in everyday interactions with people -- bring just what is needed, and don't make a mess when you'd be better understood without it.

Style, musical or otherwise, is something assumed, put on like clothing. You don't make punk music because it's "your" music, you make it because you found it and made it yours; it was on the floor, in the clubs, or on your parents' shelf. Although it might not be entirely possible, it would work to my advantage to treat feelings as an adapted style. Rather than getting stuck in an excessively tragic mood -- which is truly one of the worst, seemingly inescapable positions -- one can instead step into the dressing room and try on another reaction, from literature, philosophy, or otherwise, to that very same situation. You're not denying the feeling, but rather conscientiously directing how it plays out.