Creativity Quote by Jon Crosby

There is a particular kind of restlessness that only shows up after you have done the dream long enough for it to become a job. Jon Crosby frames it plainly: years and years of repetition, and the craving to step sideways rather than upward. The language is modest - "some kind of side thing" - but the intent is pointed. He is not talking about quitting; he is talking about recalibrating identity before it calcifies.

The subtext is creative fatigue without the melodrama. By choosing "collaboration" and "soundtrack work", Crosby signals a desire to trade the spotlight economy of band life for formats where ego dissolves into the project. Collaboration implies friction, surprise, and accountability; soundtrack work implies service to a narrative, composition with constraints, and a different measure of success than applause. It's not escapism so much as a strategic change of weather: new rules, new collaborators, new stakes.

Context matters because musicians of Crosby's generation came up in an industry that rewarded a singular brand - the band name, the signature sound - and then watched that model erode. Side projects and scoring aren't just artistic diversions now; they're survival skills and a way to stay curious in public. "Step out" is doing double duty: stepping out of the lane, and stepping out of the self that an audience expects him to be.