"I‘ve been doing it longer than I would have guessed. I didn’t think when I started Galaxie 500 I’d still be making music in twenty years. Longer than I’d dared to hope, I suppose. Being in an indie band back then, you weren’t allowed to have dreams of being huge. None of the major labels have touched anything that’s remotely left of field since the punk movement. It was all Huey Lewis. That changed with Sonic Youth and then Nirvana signing to Geffen. Alternative became this huge business, and now Arcade Fire or Vampire Weekend can be No. 1."

"If you haven’t played the songs for ten or fifteen years it’s very tingly, it’s exciting. I enjoy playing them. This promoter in Spain — he asked us to do the show in Spain in January and it was really fun and then the records were all coming out. It just seemed like a good time. I thought I should do more of these."

"You want there to be moments [in a song] where something unexpected hits you. They’ve done studies on this. What is it in a song that makes people cry? What is it that moves you? It’s something unexpected."

"Swallow my pride, it's mine to quell I'll put you through hell, I'll put you through hell"

"I take it for granted If I could love you unconditionally I- Could iron out the edges of the darkest sky For some of us, it aint enough, it aint enough"

"Why’d you wanna erase me, darling valentine?"

"You wanna leave a stain, like a relapse does"

"Drinking just to taste her mouth"

"I’ll never find another love like this"

"Lost love so strange"

"Baby when I’m 30 I’ll laugh about how dumb it felt Baby when I’m 30 I’ll laugh it out"

"I wanna spend the entire year Just face down [...] And spend the rest of it asking myself ‘Is this who you are?’ And I don’t know It just feels gross"

"I can’t keep anything down"

"Father gets up at 4AM to post a motivational video on Youtube again: ‘People of the world, nobody loves you half as much as I am trying to.'"

"The world’s gotten so small and embarrassing"

"Strange to be shaped by such strange men"

"Any conversation about Hop Along that doesn’t center on Frances Quinlan’s vocals would seem to be fooling itself. Frances’ voice can climb from a whisper to a playful croon to a raspy splinter within a minute. Even better, [they're] not afraid to go for it, often singing outside of [their] range, like [they're] throwing a ball into the air to see where it lands, convinced that whatever the result is, it will be worth hearing."

"I don’t know why I’m so mean each time I come to visit."

"I love bands that have thrown the book out the window and do exactly what feels right to them."

"I cannot stress enough how imperative it is to encourage children, even if they stink. I wasn't good, I've seen my drawings from when I was little and despite my mom's strong opinions, I think they look like a kid's drawing. I'm not going to get down on myself, but they certainly weren't those of a prodigy by any means. She told me, "You are an artist." She didn't try to turn me into a prodigy, she just encouraged me and I was very lucky to get that."

"I'm basically a rhythm guitarist at the end of the day, but I play odd forms of chords, and only in the last three years started using a pick. I wanted something kind of thick but somehow still angular and capable of dimension. I'm still figuring it out, but as I get better it gets more fun."

"I don’t ever want to get away from talking about death. I don’t want to be a drag either but I think the only way you can speak honestly is to have it in your mind."

"There's an anger at realizing the language that I lacked, the tools that I lacked to express myself and see value and power in my expression, rather than deferring to men for my value and worth."

"I’ve come to understand (better) why I felt so compelled to start going by my middle name when I turned 18 and went away to college. I needed distance from a role that I have never understood or felt agency within. Sixteen years later, it still confounds me. I know this, because for so long I thought I had to be desired to gain true worth as a person. Perhaps a lot of us have felt this way. For so long I thought I had to be a “correct” version of a woman. This is a falsehood I no longer buy. Honestly, I STILL don’t know what being a woman is. No one has been able to tell me. [...] I am embarrassed to say I did not realize how much space there has always been. It’s humans who have created these roles and strange rules. I am inspired and humbled witnessing so many who’ve taken great risk to be their true selves outside of these uneasy, fearful constructs."

"Think I should stop checking myself out in the windows of cars When I could see my future in pictures of relatives"

"Don’t worry, we will both find out, just not together"

"We were covered in each other’s snot in my childhood bed"

"8:45 a.m. The dream just escaped me again."

"At the door came a knock The witness just wants to talk to you"

"Remember seeing Shirley dancing in the oil fountain? [...] We have a great wanting in common but none of this is gonna happen to me within my lifetime"

"I know that you think you've set sail when you call my name But I get it inside my head all day When I realize I'm just hopin' onto the hope that Maybe, your feelings don't show It feels like I only go backwards, baby, Every part of me says go ahead, I've got my hopes up again, oh no, not again It feels like we only go backwards, darlin' The seed of all this indecision isn't me, oh no 'Cause I decided long ago But that's the way it seems to go, When trying so hard to get to something real, it feels It feels like I only go backwards, darlin', Every part of me says go ahead, I've got my hopes up again, oh no, not again It feels like we only go backwards, darlin'"

"The idea of going to some flash studio where there's some stranger telling you how to arrange your song is pretty absurd to us."