Quotes from Mac DeMarco

The crowd can be a little different in some places. For example, in Europe, people tend to be very respectful. They try not to make too much noise at inappropriate times. In other countries, people can be very still. Sometimes I'm not sure if a crowd is into it until the end, when they usually want me to do something crazy for the encore.

I recorded this album in a windowless room in Brooklyn by myself. I think Chamber of Reflection sums the album up better than Salad Days to tell you the truth.

I love Jonathan Richman - I love a lot of his music, and the thing I really like about him is his attitude. He seems very happy, and the way he performs is like, 'Don't worry, everybody, just get into it. I'm just having fun; I like when you guys are having fun.'

My grandma did opera singing for the better part of her life; she used to sing all over the place. My grandpa was a sax player, and he used to travel all over the place, too.

Patience is important, and also, if you don't want to do it, don't do it. But if you do, do. That's a general rule in how I live my life.

Regardless of how funny I want to be, I don't ever have a problem speaking from my heart or speaking honestly to people.

I like guitar. It just turned out that it's the instrument I learned to play. I have a lot of respect for it, and I'm learning more and more every day. For me, the classic band setup - guitars, drums, bass - will stay fresh forever. I don't know. I'm still into it.

A lot of the songs on '2' are pretty personal, but even if I'm writing about something like that, I still tend to keep it pretty simple and open-ended. I like the idea of people listening to my album and it meaning something to me but maybe meaning something else to them.

I'd probably describe my sense of humor as 'twisted,' I guess. It's not hard to make me laugh, especially when I'm surrounded by my close friends, especially my bandmates.

If people are talking about you, that's great. You start making more money, that's great. You get to go to weird places, that's great. The music industry is weird, especially with the Internet. People are calling you all kinds of weird stuff, like 'jangly.'

At the time I was writing the second album, I was sitting home in my underwear all day every day; I didn't have all that much to write about except for my own life and my family.

When you play a guitar for a long time, you get your hand oils in there; it starts feeling good and behaving, and you just don't want to mess with that.

A lot of people assume I have a great hat collection, but kids steal my hats at every show. I've had all these hats that I've loved, but now they're in some little kids' possession. It's difficult to replenish. I don't think the kids realize this.

I thought I knew Elton John, but then it was like, "Woah, Elton's a pimp! He's really amazing." And since Billy and Elton are homies, I'm finally getting it - the two piano boys.

I'm just trying to have fun, and maybe the way I hold myself kind of freaks people out. I don't feel like an outsider, and I think my friends feel the same way I do. Now that we're playing to larger audiences, maybe we're weird to some people. But I'm trying to express what I am.

When people think of someone being prolific, it's like, 'He's got a vault with 5,000 songs in it,' or something, but I just kind of pick them out of the air when they float by.

I'm getting paid to tour and travel and I don't have to work a shitty job. And it's weird because you like start getting pissed off about that.

I didn't want to play music because the whole family did it. I wanted to work in a cubicle. I saw Office Space as a young tween and missed the point of the movie. I was like, "This looks good!".

The way I'm portrayed on the Internet is partly my doing, but it's partly the people that are presenting it so, you know, people come to know this strange version of a human. It can be pretty weird because people think I'm digging through dumpsters and smell like crap all the time.

I had a band called the Sound Of Love, and that was R&B songs about girls in my high school. I played in some other indie bands who were trying to make it big; those sucked. Then I started Makeout Videotape, and that was that.

Neil Young is the prime example, the grand goal, if you will. He's still shredding, and he never lost his credibility.