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Bankrate: Considering your level of success, in what sense do you
still need to be chasing the carrot stick?
Lenny Kravitz: There's your own expectations -- your ego, your
desire to stay on your game and to stay out there. The longer you're in it, the harder it gets and the more
work it takes.
Bankrate: When you write new songs, what inspires you the most?
Lenny Kravitz: Life. All the albums are reflections of my life and
what I was thinking. I never sit down to write anything. Things just start coming out, inspired by people,
events, things ... life.
Bankrate: There have been so many changes in the music business
since your last album, with iTunes exploding, online downloads, the Radiohead experiment. Has any of this
changed the way you look at your career?
Lenny Kravitz: I've done a lot of things differently this time,
a lot of online presence I didn't have before. The business is changing by the day, and the whole model is
gonna be something else. I'm still tied to a record label right now; I'm working that way, but we'll see
what happens.
Bankrate: You recently started an interior design firm, Kravitz
Design. How did that start?
Lenny Kravitz: I just stared it. It was something I wanted to do
for myself. I can only design so many places for myself, so I opened the company. We're doing work for hotels
and residences. It's expanding and growing. I get much enjoyment out of it.
Bankrate: How did you fall in love with design?
Lenny Kravitz: It's something I always had in me. My environment
was always important to me as a kid -- my room, the way I arranged things. Aesthetically, my stuff always had
to be right. It's something in me.
Bankrate: What are some of the projects you're working on?
Lenny Kravitz: I can tell you things that just opened. One is a
hotel in Miami called The Delano. We took the ground floor below the lobby and I did a lounge/piano bar that
takes up most of that floor. It's called The Florida Room. That just opened. I did all the furniture inside
the place as well as the interior. Then, a recording studio and suite at a hotel in Miami called Setai. It's
the biggest place on South Beach, a glass, concrete tower, and then they have an old hotel in the front. That's
what we just opened up.
Bankrate: Are you doing the actual designing, or just taking more
of a supervisor/leader role?
Lenny Kravitz: Absolutely in all the details. It's not something I
just put my name on. Down to the screw. Every last detail. You're not just getting the name Kravitz Design. I'm
there. I'm there when it's going up, with the hard hat. I'm there.
Bankrate: Was this inspired solely by your love for design, or do
you have a love for the business side of things in general?
Lenny Kravitz: No, no, design. I'm an artist before a businessman.
Bankrate: That being the case, are you very hands-on with the business
side of things, or do you turn that over to others?
Lenny Kravitz: I have to be on that side as well. It's not the fun
part, but I have to.
Bankrate: That's the part you endure to get to the good stuff?
Lenny Kravitz: Yeah. I didn't grow up saying I want to be a businessman.
I want to be an artist.
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