Creativity Quote by Brian Setzer

There’s a quietly radical honesty in how Brian Setzer describes his research process: not as scholarship, but as obsession tempered by taste. “All the Sun stuff I could find” evokes a scavenger’s mindset, the kind of crate-digging devotion that treats history as something you touch, hoard, and play loud. Sun Records isn’t just a label here; it’s a myth factory - Elvis, Perkins, Lewis - a sound that modern rockabilly keeps trying to resurrect without turning it into costume.

Setzer’s real tell is the split between fidelity and feeling. He admits he “basically sat down for a month” and chose “my favorites,” which frames the project less as an authoritative recreation than as a personal mixtape with a mission. That’s the subtext: revivalism is always editing. You don’t “preserve” a scene; you curate a version of it that matches your ear, your band’s strengths, your audience’s nostalgia.

Then he undercuts the purist fantasy entirely: “I didn’t think that they were indicative of ’54 to ’57.” In other words, he knows the canon he’s assembling is not the whole story of that era - it’s the highlights reel. Yet he still “tried to stay within that period,” signaling respect for the time-bound chemistry of early rock’s ignition moment. The intent is clear: capture the adrenaline of Sun without pretending you can time-travel. It’s Setzer positioning authenticity not as accuracy, but as conviction - the right songs, played like you mean them.