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After My First Record Came Out, I Read Everything. I Was So Amazed That I Was In The Press.

-Liz Phair

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After My First Record

Liz Phair

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After My First Record Came Out, I Read Everything. I Was So Amazed That I Was In The Press.

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Madonna Is The Speedboat, And The Rest Of Us Are Just The Go-gos On Water Skis.

When I Was Young, I Used To Need Other People's Albums And I Got Very Involved With Their Music And It Meant A Lot To Me.

I'm Competitive, So I Don't Like To Feel Marginalized By The People Who Sell A Lot Of Records.

I Grew Up With A Lot Of Brothers And Male Cousins, So I Had To Worm My Way In To Get Heard. But That's Sort Of What Excites Me.

I Prefer To Be Reclusive And Private About My Creation And Then, Once I'm Finished, Present It To People.

I Love Scoring. Putting Music To Picture Is A Rewarding Challenge And One That Relies On Interpretation Of Emotion - As In, What Is The Pivotal Feeling In A Scene And Which Character's Point Of View Is Driving It At Any Given Moment?

I Don't Always Trust My Own Instincts. It Would Be Nice If Someone Else Would Tell Me What I Should Do With My Life!

I Am Just Your Ordinary, Average Every Day Sane Psycho, Supergoddess.

Well, If You've Got A One-in-a-million Girl Don't Let Her Get Away; Cause The Next One-in-a-million Girl Is A Million Girls Away.

I'm Really Happy To Be A Mom, And I'm Proud Of The Phase I'm In.

I Love Stretching Myself Musically.

I'm Really Happy With My Life Now, But There's A Lot Of Stuff I Feel Very Sad About In Ways I Can't Even Control.

You Have To Do What You Need To Do As An Artist. You Have To Have That Courage.

It Was A Source Of Shame For My Family That I Was In Rock And Roll, Which Is So Blue-collar. It Just Isn't Done. And I Felt It, Too.

I Prance Around And Dance By Myself To Hip-hop Songs In The Mirror.

I Just Don't Fit Into The Box.

Picture Being Forced To Talk Endlessly About Your Feelings And Listen And Care When What You Needed Was Just To Get Something Done.

What Does It Mean When Something Changes How It's Always Been?

I Don't Like Being Approached By People Who Look At Me Too Intensely, Who Needed Something From Me That I Didn't Have. I Don't Represent Anything.

Women Artists Need To Break Barriers In Order For Women's Experience To Be Valuable.

I Am A Feminist, And I Define Myself: Be Yourself, Because If You Can Get Away With It, That Is The Ultimate Feminist Act.

When It's Me In My Living Room, It's Pretty Pure, And Then What Gets Recorded Involves More People, And It Keeps Escalating From There.

I Don't Think Anything I Do In Life Is Planned. Sometimes I Regret That And I Feel Like I Try To Take Ahold Of The Wheel, But I'm Also Always Super Excited When Things Pop Up Spontaneously And When I'm A Little Bit Out Of My Depth. I Just Find That That Thrills Me.

I Can Feel It In My Bones: I'm Gonna Spend My Whole Life Alone.

There's Even More Stuff That I'd Like To Release, But I'm Scared To, That's Really, Um, Nerdy... Not Nerdy In A Good Way. Like, Silly.

You Been Around Enough To See That If You Think You're It, You Better Check With Me.

I Would Argue That The Uncomfortable Feelings She Elicits Are Simply The By-product Of Watching A Woman Wanting And Taking Like A Man.

Uncomfortable Feeling

And, You Know, I Still Haven't Been Contacted By Mick Jagger, Either!

That's What Music Is To Me. Like, Stuff That I Really Like To Play Loud. And I've Got My Quiet Cds, Too, That I Listen To Around The House, But If You Can't Go There, Then... Everyone Gets So Upset With Me, I Can't Win

When I Use The Internet, It's Pretty Much Strictly For Music. Checking Out Other People's Web Sites, What's Going On, Listening To Music. It's Pretty Much A Musical Thing For Me.

I Am Just Like You And Everyone Else. I Am Trying To Live My Life As Best I Can.

Just To Prove I Was Right That It's Harder To Be Friends Than Lovers And You Shouldn't Try And Mix The Two, Cause If You Do And Then You're Still Unhappy, Then You Know That The Problem Is You.

I Don't Mind People Not Liking Me As Long As There's Mutual Respect.

Love Is Nothing, Nothing, Nothing Like They Say.

Composing Gives Me A Chance To Work In Multiple Dimensions And Helps Me Pare Down My Melodies Into What Is Essential. Learning New Skills Has Always Energized Me And Scoring Has Opened Up A World Of Sonic Possibilities.

Yeah, I Like To Be The Maker Of The Art. And I Like And Want The Money. But I Don't Really Dig Being Famous.

I Was Trying To Break Out Of The Suburbs, And When I Did Break Out, I Don't Think I Took My Whole Self With Me - I Think I Played A Role Of Being Too Cool And Hip.

Now, In Music, It Seems More Like The Popular Crowd Suppresses Anyone Who Is Different.

It’s Nice To Be Liked, But It’s Better By Far To Get Paid.

I Knew That Collaborating On Songwriting Would Be Difficult For A Lot Of People, Because I Was Known Very Much, For My Independence And The Fact That I Wrote These Quirky Songs That Were Not Typical Structure, Not Typical Sound - You Know, Really Original Stuff.

Women's Bodies Are Used To Sell Anything And Everything Because It Works, It Grabs People's Attention, And Advertisers Aren't Going To Stop Using Something That Works.

I Am Comfortable Performing Now. I Love It!

Isn't This The Best Part Of Breakin' Up? Finding Someone Else You Can't Get Enough Of. Someone Who Wants To Be With You, Too.

Finding Someone

My Identity Has Everything To Do With Me And My Instrument. It Doesn't Have To Do With What Production Style I Use, Or How Many People Played On It, Whether It's Sparse Or Grandiose Or Whatever. And I'm Social, Frankly.

The Big News Already Broke. The File-sharing And All That Stuff, It's A Done Deal. And I Think Figuring Out How To Make That A Fair Exchange For The People That Make Music Is Still An Issue

I Don't Have The Same Access Or Time To Gain Access To Music The Way I Used To.

I Don't Think You Can Spend Too Much Time As An Artist Believing What Other People Think.

Lana Del Rey Seems To Be Bothering Everybody Because She Allegedly Remade Herself From A Folk Singing, Girl-next-door Type Into An Electro-urban Kitty Cat On The Prowl (of Course I Like Her), And They Feel She Is Inauthentic.

So How Does Liz Phair Feel About Lana Del Rey? Well, As A Recording Artist, I've Been Hated, I've Been Ridiculed, And Conversely, Hailed As The Second Coming. All That Matters In The End Is That I've Been Heard.

I Try To See Interviewing As Performance Art, And Just Take It As It Comes.

Wearing A Veneer Of Perfection Never Did Me Any Good.

It Seems To Me Like The Internet Allows You To Break That Structure A Little Bit. You Know, Here's Your Cd That's Going Into Stores, Here's Your Ep That You Offer Online, Here's A Subscription For Songs You Recorded On The Road, Here's Your Live Stuff Streaming.

People Hang Their Hopes On You Fitting Into Their Cd Collection In Way That They Have Made A Space For, But I'm Playing A Longer Game Than That.

I Think Good Art Happens On That Edge Between Comfortable And In A Lot Of Pain, You Know What I Mean?

I Mean, I Think About It, But I Don't Design My Record To Get A Certain Public Response.

I Have My Head Screwed On Right. I Haven't Been This Way In A Long Time.

I'd Like To Do A Tour With A Bunch Of People Where It's Just Them And Their Guitars. It Would Be Like Lilith Fair - Only Everyone Plays Alone, And It Would Be Competitive.

You're Really Creative When You're In An Environment That You Don't Know How To Handle. So Collaborating Was Like That For Me. I Think That Was One Of The Reasons Why I Knew I Was Gonna Get A Challenging Reaction.

Music Is Sound. It's A Wave. It's Going Out And Coming Back, And It's Bouncing Off.

No. You Know What Really Bugs Me About My Videos? When They Can't Figure Out What To Do, They Just Have Me Change Clothes Five Times.

That's Exactly What's Exciting For Me - The Idea Of Infiltrating The Male Structure And Affecting Change From Within.

I Wear Clothes That Most People In The Midwest Would Probably Deem Inappropriate At My Age. And I Rock A Bikini All Summer Long. I Know That It's Not Normal, But I Just Don't Care. I Live Once.

I'm Very Cerebral. I Like To Think Things Through.

Thinking Things Through

The Other Day I Was Reading A Blog And I Linked Over To Streisand's Web Site, And It Was Amazing Politically. She's So Insightful And Incisive. And She Also Says Whatever She Wants.

I Don't Know What The Future Holds. Anything Is Possible.

I've Lost Touch With A Lot Of That Boutique-type Music Just Because Of My Age, And Raising My Son And The Multiple Jobs I Have At This Point.

The License Said You Had To Stick Around Until I Was Dead, But If You're Tired Of Looking At My Face I Guess I Already Am.

Nothing Feeds A Hunger Like A Thirst

I Don't Know; It Just Seemed Like The Cooler Guys Are Playing Xbox. At Least The Ones I Know.

All Parents Gush About What It's Like To Be A Parent. I Love It.

I Blend My Green Drink Every Morning. I Also Fix My Son A Full-on American Breakfast With Bacon And Toast.

I Just Want To Make Music And Make A Living. I Just Have To Find The Means Of Doing That.

Young Kids Don't Have Their Identity, So Everything Is So Important. Now I'm Mature. I Know Who I Am And I Know What My Thing Is And I Know What I'm Bringing. It's Very Clear And Defined.

Like, I Kind Of Developed My Musical Style In A Vacuum. Even Though I Listen To A Lot Of Stuff, The Way I Wrote Was In My Bedroom, Really Privately. It's Still The Way I Write, Actually.

I Probably Had Some Impact, Because Everyone Keeps Telling Me That I Did. I Like To Feel Like I'm Coming Out With Something To Try To Make Room For Other Young Women To Make Their Art.

I Don't Know Why It Surprises People That I Surprise Them.

I Always Give The Encore Over To Chaos, So People Can Yell Out Requests And I Can Hack My Way Through A Song That I Don't Really Know Anymore.

I Just Want To Hear The True Voices Of Women Self-expressing - Smart Ones, Stupid Ones, Ugly Ones, Beautiful Ones, Good Ones, Bad Ones, Fat Ones, Thin Ones, All Of It - Until The Profound Silence That Has Resounded Throughout History Is Filled With A Healthy Chorus Coming From Our Side Of The Aisle.

I Mean, I Kind Of Remember... I'm 36 Now, So It's Kind Of Hard For Me To Relate To What It Was Like When I Was 25, Or 24, But I Do Remember A Period In Time When That's How I Defined Who I Was, By The Music I Listened To And The Movies I Went To.

I Remember Even Getting Kicked Out Of A Bar Once Because I Was Too Loud And Obnoxious.

When You Love What You Do, You're Happy Just Doing It.

After My First Record Came Out, I Read Everything. I Was So Amazed That I Was In The Press.

I Can't Say I Don't Get Nervous, But I Really Kind Of Enjoy Performing Now.

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