"I just like simplicity. I like simple songs, I like simple chords, simple vocals, simple lead guitar. I just like simplicity. That's just the way I like it"
About this Quote
Jeremy Spencer is making a taste statement that doubles as a quiet manifesto: strip it down, keep it human, don’t confuse effort with value. In an era of musicianship-as-flex, “simplicity” can sound like a retreat. Here it reads more like a dare. He repeats the word the way a blues player repeats a riff: not because he’s out of ideas, but because he’s staking out a groove and insisting it’s enough.
The intent is practical and aesthetic. Simple chords and vocals aren’t an absence of craft; they’re a refusal of clutter. Spencer’s list is telling: songs first, then the building blocks (chords, vocals, lead guitar). He’s arguing that the point is the song, not the architecture. The subtext is a critique of progressive complexity and studio polish, the kind of music that asks listeners to admire it rather than feel it. “That’s just the way I like it” lands as both humility and boundary-setting: he’s not trying to win an argument, he’s declaring what moves him.
Context matters. Spencer came up in the British blues boom, where directness and economy were prized, and later in Fleetwood Mac’s early, guitar-forward years before the band’s pop reinvention. Against that backdrop, simplicity reads like loyalty to a lineage: Chicago blues, rockabilly, gospel forms where a few chords carry a lot of life. His repetition also signals a musician’s truth: the simplest parts are the hardest to make convincing. The real complexity is in the feel.
The intent is practical and aesthetic. Simple chords and vocals aren’t an absence of craft; they’re a refusal of clutter. Spencer’s list is telling: songs first, then the building blocks (chords, vocals, lead guitar). He’s arguing that the point is the song, not the architecture. The subtext is a critique of progressive complexity and studio polish, the kind of music that asks listeners to admire it rather than feel it. “That’s just the way I like it” lands as both humility and boundary-setting: he’s not trying to win an argument, he’s declaring what moves him.
Context matters. Spencer came up in the British blues boom, where directness and economy were prized, and later in Fleetwood Mac’s early, guitar-forward years before the band’s pop reinvention. Against that backdrop, simplicity reads like loyalty to a lineage: Chicago blues, rockabilly, gospel forms where a few chords carry a lot of life. His repetition also signals a musician’s truth: the simplest parts are the hardest to make convincing. The real complexity is in the feel.
Quote Details
| Topic | Music |
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