As a busker, one thing that does not work is self-consciousness. A busker needs to be working. A busker needs to shed all ego and get down to work. Play your songs, play them well, earn your money, and don't get in people's way. Glen Hansard More Quotes by Glen Hansard More Quotes From Glen Hansard A song is like a saddle: you ride it for a while, and if it's the right kind of song you can sing it for the rest of your life. Glen Hansard rest-of-your-life music song We saw too much beauty to be cynical, felt too much joy to be dismissive, climbed too many mountains to be quitters, kissed too many girls to be deceivers, saw too many sunrises not to be believers, broke too many strings to be pro's and gave too much love to be concerned where it goes. Glen Hansard cynical girl joy Our imagination it is our greatest ally . . . Imagination is a very, very powerful thing. It literally invents the path before you. Glen Hansard allies powerful imagination If you don't mark your successes, the day your ship comes in could be just another day at the office, and there's no poetry in that. Glen Hansard ships another-day office I choose to believe that there is good in people and that everything is a lesson. Our place on Earth is to go deeper, to somehow get wiser. To have spirit. Glen Hansard lessons believe people Certain songs have a life, and certain songs don't. A song is like a saddle: you ride it for a while, and if it's the right kind of song you can sing it for the rest of your life. And then other songs are only really important for certain periods of your life, and you move on from them and find yourself not necessarily needing to sing them anymore. Glen Hansard finding-yourself song moving I grew up wearing black arm-bands when the hunger strikers died. I went on those marches. I grew up basically a Provo, though I never obviously got into any activities. I was writing 'IRA, Brits out' on walls all over where I grew up, but that was a false sense of Irishness. Glen Hansard wearing-black wall writing I just didn't realize, being a young person, that if you sign up to make a film, a certain portion of your soul is forever gone. From there on, you are that character to everybody you'll ever meet again. Glen Hansard soul forever character Everything about singing, I learned from busking. Everything I learned about songwriting, I learned from busking. Busking, you learn people, you learn about reading people. You learn about reading the atmosphere of the street. If you stand still in any city long enough, you see everyone pass you by. It's almost like you get to know personality types, just by watching people walk past. You get a sense for things. Glen Hansard reading cities past You know, albums are a funny thing. They're not like an intellectual decision. It's a collection of your kind of musings. Like it's a collection of your diary entries and you pick which one's gonna make the most sense together and you put out a record and you sort of live it. Glen Hansard funny-things intellectual decision I think it's very interesting, people who can't stand people who whinge and whine. It seems almost like a class issue. Because you think about who is the most positive, who's the most redemptive songwriter that's ever existed in your lifetime? Glen Hansard issues class thinking The moment of drifting into thought has been so clipped by modern technology. Our lives are filled with distraction with smartphones and all the rest. People are so locked into not being present. Glen Hansard smartphones technology people Our imagination just needs space. It's all it needs, that moment where you just sort of stare into the distance where your brain gets to sort of somehow rise up. Glen Hansard distance space imagination Do I create conflicts for myself? Sure I do. Glen Hansard conflict I won't say I've closed the door on acting. Glen Hansard acting doors There are people who can sit down and write a song about any given subject, and they can do it really, really well. Glen Hansard writing song people I think inside every rock journalist, there's somebody who wishes they had the courage to live the life that they're not, and that they're writing about. But at the same time, inside every songwriter, I guess there's a wish for happiness. Glen Hansard live-life writing thinking Sometimes travelling really intensely for a long time is like having a continuous nervous breakdown. Glen Hansard sometimes long travel My dad was quiet, angry, shut down. So my thing is: I express everything that's there. I want to get it all out. Glen Hansard dad want quiet Keeping the pen out of your hand as much as possible is the best way to write a song, in my estimation. But the pen must come in to tighten it up. Glen Hansard writing song hands
