Quotes from Jim James

All the Southerners think we're Yanks, and all the Yanks think we're Southerners, and all the Midwesterners think we're East. Everybody's always wrong about Louisville. That's kind of why I love it so much.

I think anyone who knows the audio process knows what mixing and mastering is.

You spend all day getting the song goo,d and you're listening to it late at night, and you're happy with it. But you should sleep on it and come back in the morning and make sure.

I feel like modern country is deliberately dumbing down the human race. They're deliberately making people take glory in being uneducated and racist, and it's just sad. I think it's absolute mind control.

You want to make a record that stands the test of time and that people enjoy.

I grew up on, and kind of came of age, during the grunge movement and was introduced to Neil Young and Bob Dylan and grew up on that path.

When I make a record with My Morning Jacket, I love what those guys do, so I don't have a need to play bass or drums or anything, because we're doing that as a unit.

We don't have universal health care. Education is so expensive. We have these massive problems, you know? So it makes me really happy to think that somebody could have all the music in the world for free. But at the same time, if you have enough money to pay for it, you should pay for it.

Live music is proof that there's some things the Internet can't kill. In our lifetime, we're going to see more and more things start to disappear and get gobbled up by the Internet, but live music won't be one of them.

I feel like everybody's got their health issues and their battles, and yeah, mine go up and down. It's never really over.

My aunt played upright bass in the Louisville Orchestra, and I was always really impressed by her musical ability. I found it really fascinating as a kid that one could play music for a living.

'The Muppet Show' was huge. I watched it all the time as a kid, and I really loved the way they used music on that. I also remember hearing the radio in the car as a kid, like Stevie Wonder and Simon and Garfunkel.

Whenever we come back from another project, we're always so stoked to see each other and play with each other again. I really feel like that's been the key to why we're still together as a band. I remember a period five or six years ago feeling a little burnt out and wasn't sure whether I wanted to keep doing it.

I've never stared out at the ocean while I've made a record before - that enhances things in a strange way.

I like to be productive - it's very hard for me to go on vacation because I just feel like I'm losing time.

That's the bulk of my lyrical output - being confused and trying to find answers to my confusion.

Big religion was started with one goal in mind: to make money. And I'm not knocking anyone's faith, because I think there are a lot of good values to be found in any faith. But when any faith starts to get in the way of love, that's where you can tell that greed and fear have stepped in and that those things come from man.

I think maybe the vehicle for me was 'Sam Cooke's Greatest Hits.' It has a song called, 'Touch the Hem of His Garment.' Do you know that song? I kind of got obsessed with that song and started exploring and getting more of his old recordings with the Soul Stirrers and really getting into that super, super deeply.

I love hearing old Bob Marley recordings that he did before he made the versions everybody knows.

I've always loved that, on all the Dylan and Springsteen and Marley and Neil Young reissues that they've done: It's so cool to hear alternate versions and how the song started in their mind.

I just think bad vibes and hate and Trump are getting so much airtime, we need to speak out loud for peace and equality and fairness and make sure we all know that there are a lot of us out here in the world that just want love.

For me, 'Evil Urges' was like a video game. If you play 'Super Mario Brothers,' there's a level where it's like a snowscape, and then there's a level where it's a desert and a level that's like a jungle.

I think reading is one of the greatest forms of magic available to us on the planet. Reading is so important.

Somebody brought up the idea of reissuing 'Tribute To 1' because it was out of print on vinyl.