M. Ward

“I wouldn't want to cover a Hank Williams song in a country-western way. It doesn't occur to me instinctually to re-create productions. I'm interested in re-creating songs. Putting different clothes on them.”

“I definitely don't see myself as much of a singer, because my upbringing is really based around the guitar, learning chord progressions and that sort of thing. So the singing aspect of what I do has been a secondary adventure.”

“I believe in working with songs that have personal value for me.”

“I always prefer other people's interpretations over my own, so I'm not very quick to make explicit what exactly a song or record is about.”

“I love the idea that I planned my career. I did not. It started out by getting invitations from artists that I really love and respect, to share a stage... I've been very lucky in that I haven't had to create a five-year plan. It's evolved.”

“There's a relationship between music and spirituality and inspiration and to a certain extent improvisation that draws me in, because I don't totally understand it. I know that those relationships have been telling me, since I started making records, where to go. What to write down.”

“I learned a long time ago that fame and money is not a ticket to happiness.”

“Certain things you have to stumble on to. They can't be preprogrammed.”

“I get most of my inspiration from older records. Most of the records that I listen to were probably made before I was born, and I was born in the mid-'70s. I don't know why, exactly, I'm drawn to those sounds.”

“I have a very strong belief in God.”

“When you work on a record for three years, it's a great sense of relief when it is finally out in the world. It just feels good.”

“I don't really watch TV series because I don't want to get hooked on them and have them suck up all my time.”

“I've worked with just as many talented women as I have talented men, and I feel fortunate enough to have that great balance.”

“One of the great things about music is that it has the capability of time travel - you smell a certain smell in the room and it takes you back to your childhood. I feel like music is able to do that, and it happens to me all the time.”

“I love the sound of Elmore James, the sound early guitarists like him got just by using minimal means.”

“The South of France is one of my favorite places in the world.”

“I got this Christmas gift with the entire Beatles catalog. I had fun trying to duplicate what I was hearing on these records, only using the instruments I had at hand - an acoustic guitar, and that's all. It was endlessly amusing to me to try to imitate John Lennon and Paul McCartney's harmonies using the guitar.”

“The best live recordings capture elements of surprise onstage.”

“When I first started making music, it was learning other people's songs and putting them onto four-track. Like Beatles songs and stuff. When I started writing, I used the singing side of the production as a vehicle for melody and lyrical ideas.”

“I don't like the way recording to digital sounds. Most of the time, when I'm recording to two-inch tape, I still have a romantic vision of how songs sounded coming out of the radio when I was younger, and how they sounded coming out of my little four-track cassette player.”