Fred Armisen
I'm so glad cities have personalities, just like people have personalities. That's something that makes me smile.Collection: Smile
Fereydun, that's my dad's name. My grandmother, my dad's mom, when she was pregnant, she was dating a man from Persia, a Persian gentleman. It wasn't his child, but he was still very supportive and said, 'Hey, this is a great name,' and so it stuck. So that's what she named him.Collection: Dating
My mom is from Venezuela, and my dad is German and Japanese, and we lived in Brazil when I was a kid for a couple of years, and then I grew up on Long Island. I think all the traveling and all the nationalities put that stuff in my head. I was just around it a lot.Collection: Mom
When I used to see Rick Moranis do something, to me that was immediately funny. Or George Carlin or Martin Lawrence.Collection: Funny
My father came from Germany. My mom came from Venezuela. My father's culturally German, but his father was Japanese. I was raised in New York and spent two years in Rio. My parents met at the University of Southern Mississippi, and they had me there, and then we moved to New York. I'm not very familiar with Mississippi.
Everyone knows deep in their hearts that the drums are the coolest instrument, and that a band is only as good as its drummer. So I'm all for drum solos. I'm all for drummers hamming it up. I'm all for drummers standing up and kicking over the kit.
Every day, I wanna work on being a better person, not just to others but to myself.
No yoga. I can barely sit down.
I have an inability to relax. I try to make every day a work day. I get pleasure from work... I try to think of sketch ideas, stand-up pieces. I am incapable of leisure and leisure time.
I believe in limitations. I think the worst art ever made - in my opinion, because it's all so subjective - is where the artist had complete freedom.
I will admit that I purposely stress myself out. But I think I like stressing myself out. There's a glamour to, like, 'I've got to get to the airport!' I just like the caricature.
Discomfort is the way to go if you want to make something you feel is worthwhile.
I enjoy getting to work on 'Saturday Night Live', where I get to do people like David Paterson. And then, its like a different muscle to do someone like a bicycle guy on' Portlandia'.
Even when I go do comedy stuff live, I can still feel the drummer in me about to go onstage.
If something seems like a little venue, don't treat it like that. Do it all. If you're sort of wondering why you're doing something at some location, just do it - any size theater, production, or whatever. It's all helpful.
My favorite song is 'Cybele's Reverie' by Stereolab.
When 'Pale Fire' came out, that album was a big friend of mine. I've just always purely been a fan of El Perro del Mar.
I feel bad for everyone I've gone out with.
I came away from 'Saturday Night Live' feeling very well represented. I felt, and I still feel like, they let me do so much stuff that I wanted to do. Stuff that I almost didn't even know what it was.
I think I was a terrible husband, I think I'm a terrible boyfriend.
I want it all... fast. I want to be married, I want to live together... and then somewhere around a year or two years, I get freaked out. I freak out emotionally and then I actually feel like 'Oh my God, who's this stranger in my house?'
I love 'Saturday Night Live,' and I really feel like people who have left before me have always stayed with the show. They never really quite left, which is nice. Everyone kind of stays close.
I spent a lot of time lifting my drums into a van, playing to ten people night after night. I can't complain about anything now. That stuff was heavy.
Steve Jobs was a real rock star to me. I looked forward to his products like people look forward to albums.
The day of parts of the country hating each other, or rivalries like that... I feel like that's dead.
I'm drawn to punk. I'm drawn to samba a bit. I don't think there's a type of music I'm not drawn to. Lykke Li I really like. Holy Sons I still can't get enough of.
I can't relax. I'm not happy unless I'm working on stuff. 'SNL' is always a huge workload, as enjoyable as it is.
Bill Hader does a really good impression of me.
There's something really easy and just somehow un-crowded about the Portland airport. Every time I go there I'm like, 'Why is this so easy and sweet?'
At 'SNL' there's framed pictures of all the cast members, and it starts with Dan Aykroyd. It's linear. It just keeps going through all these people, and then you're at the end of it.
When I first started going to Portland, people told me about Stumptown. They were like 'Oh, it's the best coffee,' and I thought, 'How good could it really be?' I'm like, 'Sure, great, uh... I'd love to see it.' But then when I went, it truly, I am not kidding, is the best coffee I have ever had.
Chalkboards being used inside the restaurant seem to be a good sign that the proprietors are proud of their food, and that's kind of nice, actually - it's a nice personal touch.
Prince is my favorite ever. I've liked Prince since... It's been a really long time. Even in junior high. I used to only like punk for a while, and I had all these rules for what kinds of groups were cool, and who was not cool, but as soon as I saw this one Prince video... It just broke all those rules. I was like, 'I love this no matter what.'
I've met Tony Danza. He was really nice. And he looks... I feel like he hasn't aged. He looks exactly the same. He's just Tony Danza. He's exactly the same as he's always been.
When people say that L.A. doesn't have a culture, I think it really does: a very old culture, and very specific. There's streets named after entertainers, and statues of entertainers, and it's great. Entertainment is still art, even if it makes billions of dollars. So it's like a city built on entertainment, and art in a way.
I would really like to do a movie. Schedule-wise I don't know when exactly, but I think it would be great to do a Portlandia movie. Some of my favorite television shows have done it and they've been great. Like Monty Python. I think it would be great.
I loooved Sleater-Kinney like a crazy person.
I try to maintain a high level of coolness. Which means I've gotta look at lot of magazines. I've gotta look at a lot of ads to see what people want to wear.
I don't think there's an archetype for the Justin Bieber fan. A Bieber fan just looks like an American. You wouldn't even need a costume to try and resemble one.
I've always been a fan of instructional videos. The bass-player ones are insane. The music on them is fascinating. It's not something you hear on CDs or would really ever play in bands. You listen to it and are like, 'What is happening?' It's this blizzard of notes in weird time signatures, and they're trying to teach you that.
Every music journalist I've ever met has been stunningly beautiful.
There are bands that I am friends with, who will invite me up on stage. Like Les Savy Fav, who have had me on stage, and I have played on their record. There are a couple of bands like that. Yo La Tengo has invited me to play with them.
There are people who are genetically made to start record labels, and I'm not one of those people. People just have it in their blood and are good at it. Corey Rusk from Touch and Go and Ian MacKaye. These are people who have made their own labels.
I tend to think that there is a sophistication to everything at 'Saturday Night Live,' including the sketches.
I'm obsessed with my 20s. I buy things that I wanted in my 20s. It's weird; it's a weird thing that I didn't grow out of.
Sometimes 'Portlandia' can be pretty traditional. But the stuff I've always loved on 'SNL' has always been the weirdest stuff I've done. The stuff that went on at 10 to 1 in the morning.
I am opposed to vacations and leisure. I try to make every day a work day. Even if there's nothing on my schedule, I will try do at least one task that is work-related.
I am immediately disinterested when I hear mountain-climbing stories.
My favorite album is 'Ram' by Paul and Linda McCartney.
I'm glad I get to do characters. It's just like a Polaroid shot of whoever the person is, and to me, anyway, that's kind of what life is like. You get a general sense of somebody, and then we're all good, we get it. We understand each other.