A biography for Aaron Dessnerhasn’t been written yet.
“For whatever reason, you gravitate to certain subjects, and I read a lot of history.”
“Sometimes my brother and I - we're twins, and sometimes we joke that we're like a two-headed monster. We can be hard to deal with because we don't break ranks; we stick together.”
“White people need to wake up and tell the truth about US history and the inequality and the ways in which racism is so entrenched.”
“The National's favorite experiences as musicians are when we are collaborating with people a little outside of our world as a band.”
“There have definitely been phases of the National, many years ago, where we did party, and various people, in their own way, fell off the wagon.”
“There are people who want to hear what they consider your hits. There are people who want you to experiment and explore random, rare things. And it's kind of a different; they're two different beasts.”
“I always want to have time to experiment, and have transitional things, and have these weird non-songs, but usually the stuff I'm working on comes down to this weird deadline, where it just never happens, and it's kind of a bummer.”
“I'm very fortunate and grateful to wake up every morning in the rural countryside I live in, looking at farmland and these beautiful mountains.”
“I guess I like minor chords better than major ones, in general.”
“Our writing, especially during 'Boxer' - the recording process was the writing process, which is not the way I would advise anyone else to do it.”
“From the very beginning, we just sort of made things up together. That's one of the great things about having a twin brother; you have a sort of feedback loop, where you can bounce things off of each other.”
“I had been living with my family in France as COVID was starting to spiral out of control in Europe. I said to my wife that maybe they should come back to the States with me because I was worried about getting separated.”
“I thought I was going to play soccer in college.”
“One of the negative sides of a really intense arc as a touring band is there are big gaps in your memory because you're so exhausted.”
“I do have a way of playing piano where it's very melodic and emotional, but then often it's great if whoever's singing doesn't sing exactly what's in the piano melody, but maybe it's connected in some way.”
“We wanted to create an opportunity for people to share anything, on their own terms, revenue and all. Get away from the commerce side of music, which can be exciting and necessary but ultimately dilutes the creative impulse. The further and further you go down that path is sometimes the further you are from the reason why you started making music.”
“There are some things that you see that are hard to talk about. You can't talk about it. You just bear witness to them.”
“It's very exciting to have a festival in the heart of Boston. It's an amazing experience to be in a city and to be able to walk in and out of a festival. I think that's part of what's going to make Boston Calling really special.”
“Music for me is an emotional necessity. It's therapy. It's what I live and breathe.”
“Sometimes you become the person people try to pin you into a corner to be, which is not really fair.”