Was there tentativeness on your part—as producer, making Ten New Songs—not to infringe on whatever vibe he had going?
Of course, I brought in my aesthetic musically, but as a producer my job was really to facilitate his expression. And I tried to keep my eye on the ball with that all the time… It was not up to me to push any concept of mine on him, but to open things up and offer ideas for him to choose from.
So it wasn’t a Phil Spector rerun.
No! [laughing]
Leonard is known for spending eons writing his works; for you, is songwriting an effort?
Yes, it often is quite a bit of an effort. You never know, when you write a song, how it’s going to go. Some of them… I’m sure you’ve heard people say, ‘They write themselves.’ Others definitely don’t [laughing]. And there are songs where, parts of it, you really feel good about and believe in and then other parts you don’t. You may spend years trying to fix a song.
Of the songs that you wrote alone on Everybody Knows, did you know at the start of the endeavor that these songs were meant for you to sing?
Some I wrote years ago when I was writing for other people, but most of them I wrote for myself. It took me a little while to find that voice, to figure out what it [was] that I wanted to say. It was difficult, but extremely worthwhile. I feel good enough to have found an identity for myself as an artist.
There’s an ethereal vibe in the music and your vocals even reflect that on some songs as well with slight echo effects and embellishments. Yet the songs are weighed down by an intimate, almost meditative quality. Was that something you wanted to achieve, that contrasted dynamic?
I was looking for a sound that was mine. And I had to dig deep to find it, but at the same time it felt very natural. It feels like the kind of music that I like, what I want to put out there. The ethereal quality that you talk about, it’s just part of the way I find the emotion.
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