Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
So that's why you've got to try, you got to breath and have some fun. Though I'm not paid, I play this game, and I won't stop until I'm done. But what I really want to know is - Are you gonna go my way?
My son and my daughter have both been an incredibly sustaining force, especially through this recent bad patch [of health]. So, I've been blessed and grateful for their company and for their assistance.
Most of the time one is discouraged by the work, but now and again by some grace something stands out and invites you to work on it, to elaborate it or animate it in some way. It's a mysterious process.
I'm more prone to his '70s material, which is what I was around for and watched a lot. I listen to a lot of that stuff. It probably influenced me quite a bit. I'm more drawn to the darker, sadder songs.
When you sit down and think about what rock 'n' roll music really is, then you have to change that question. Played up-tempo, you call it rock 'n' roll; at a regular tempo, you call it rhythm and blues.
I think I've been a bit misunderstood; the first record was more timid than I wanted it to be. I don't like getting pinned down by sex or how I sound like because it's not who I am or what I want to be.
I think I was probably an early teenager when I discovered Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and a bunch of people that are on a long list of artists. They were important to me, especially as an early adolescent.
I think it's flattering when people say I'm a role model, but I don't think I am. It depends on your outlook on the word 'role model.' I'm not perfect or anything. I just consider it a great compliment.
How can you allow the trading companies to locate computers closer to exchanges and flash millions of bids to give an unfair advantage? Even professionals are losing faith in some aspects of the system.
I'm my worst critic, and I like the fact that I can listen to myself now and make fun of myself, listen, make changes - 'Oh, man, that's messed up. Okay, I need to work on that; I need to work on this.'
So many people are like, 'I'm perfect.' I'm so imperfect; that's why I'm able to let everything out and let people see everything. 'Cause I'm just a mess like every other person that's a mess out there.
I wouldn't say I worked with these people because I was looking for a particular vocal sound. I worked with them because I loved what they had done before-and because they really wanted to work with me.
People who grew up as child stars have the same thing in common. You're cute, they love you; you go through the awkward stage, they don't accept you any more. Very few make the transition to adult star.
I learned what I could do with my voice on stages and because of the people that I was around. It wasn't me sitting in a room by myself. I didn't know what I was doing. I was figuring it out on the fly.
I don't get too much enjoyment out of sitting around the campfire and looking at old photos. That's just not me. I don't get the thrill of doing that. So, I don't sit around listening to my old records.
I feel like once the song is done, you put it out there and if people want to do bizarre remixes, if people want to make strange videos, great. You know, like chaos theory applied to the music business.
In the course of my life, I've made some happy songs but it's the more sort of like pathos-laden, emotional, melancholic music that either I make or that other people make that really resonates with me.
I don't think there's anything wrong with not knowing how to play an instrument, but the rise of the non-musical producer has done away with musicianship and focused attention purely on the song's hook.
Since I stopped drinking my love life has taken a really serious hit. Romantic encounters that seemed like a really good idea at three o'clock in the morning on the Lower East Side? Less so in sobriety.
I'm not trying to look for pity or sympathy. I was just surprised that so many people in the world of entertainment seemed to be okay with misogyny and homophobia as long as they were profiting from it.
It sounds funny, but my biggest fear is that I'm not perfect. I'm a perfectionist, and I get upset when things go wrong or when I don't do well. I used to be very uptight, but I've learned to loosen up.
As an actor, rejection is a big part of it, and I've had a lot of it. So when there's something that you really want to do, it's so great to have someone to be a part of a team as great as this team is.
I get to wake up every day and create music. And even when it's a tough moment as far as career ups and downs, it's always something you're passionate about, and it's a beautiful way to spend your life.
There's really never any sort of master plan. I find if I've got a couple of tunes that I think are possibilities, I phone everyone up and get them into the studio and we'll have a go at recording them.
I've got friends and my family and people who've been around for years and years and years. And those people are never in doubt: They'd be my friend whether I was a homeless dude, or I had a hit single.
Everyone wants to pretend like they sprang out of the ground with an Animal Collective record in their hands and a David Bowie haircut, and that's just not the case. You discover these things gradually.
I'm more concerned with the work people do than their gender. When I was younger, I was pretty judgmental. Things had to be a certain way. Now I just want to see the work. It doesn't matter who does it.
When I play solo, that's when I put it all together. I go through all of the songs that I've written wtih all of the different bands; that, for me, tells its own story, and the DVDs really enforce that.
I got shocked really bad at a show once. We do this big intro to a cover of the Smiths' "Panic on the Streets of London" and I got a huge shock and went, 'Ohhhh!' We had to stop the show for 15 minutes.
I've changed a great deal. I used to be vicious to my parents, just because they objected to me going full-time with a group. Now I can see that all they wanted was the best for me. And we get on great.
I don't have to take a trip around the world or be on a yacht in the Mediterranean to have happiness. I can find it in the little things, like looking out into my backyard and seeing deer in the fields.
Don't you want to know what's real and what's not? I remember when I was a kid, you know, this whole Cold War thing. They had us scared of the Russians. So, it's almost like, what's real and what's not?
It's really interesting with art-movies too, but art especially - to see how your attitude toward artists and works and your level of appreciation of them is always shifting and changing over the years.
When you're young, you don't especially think of yourself as being young. You're just alive and everything's interesting and you don't think of things in terms of age because you're not conscious of it.
There's all these musicians in the world, and anybody that takes enough time to create a record or even think about the fantasy of rock & roll, it's a vulnerable place to be in, it's a huge thing to do.
I'm terrible at social media, and it sucks for me, because I know I have fans. But if you go by my Instagram, you would think, 'No one listens to her music!' It's not fair. My Instagram is not my music.
We are the cause of a world that's gone wrong. Nature will survive us, we've been wrong after all. We are the cause of a world that's gone wrong. Wouldn't it be great to heal the world with only a song?
I lost my sense of trust, honesty and compassion. I crashed down and became what I consider an emotional mess. I've never been so miserable in my whole life. I just wanted to go to bed and never get up.
There's something to writing a hook and something to writing a memorable melody. That's what I liked about musicals. Then I realized I could write my own songs, and I didn't have to sing other people's.
I wasn't encouraged to write just stand there and sing and I never thought I was a writer. I always figured if I couldn't write something as good as "He Stopped Loving Her Today," then what's the point?
One of my strongest memories is my father playing bongos in the living room in Detroit listening to Motown radio. He was this skinny white bald guy, but he was really moved by blues and Motown and funk.
It's alright, just wait and see, your string of lights is still bright to me. Who you are is not where you've been. You're still an innocent. It's okay life is a tough crowd, 32 is still growing up now.
I stopped reading articles about myself. Even if it's not bad, I think actively caring about people's daily perception of you makes you second-guess everything. I am very happily not paranoid right now.
I was thinking about how a playlist is really so inadequate as opposed to a mixtape because it takes seventeen days to really make a mixtape with a homemade cover that you like and that you'd give away.
Our Feastival of Queens area, which featured five different authentic ethnic foods from Queens, was one of the most popular areas of the festival, and was written about in a number of different reviews.
People are always saying, 'You're really nice, I thought you were going to be a complete asshole.' I'm getting pretty fed up with it. I just want to say to them, 'Well I could always piss on your head.'
I can still make a living with touring. And maybe you buy a t-shirt. And I would rather 10 million people get my record and listen to it for free than 500,000 that I coerced to pay $15 for it, you know?
Just true to form with life sometimes - what you're trying to do doesn't necessarily work out, but what ends up happening can be a lot better. I just relax and say whatever is going to happen - happens.
You kind of have to celebrate the moment that you get to create something that you love that falls into the parameters of a 3-minute-and-20-second song, to try to be creative inside of those parameters.
Won't You guide me through the dark night of the soul That I may better understand Your way... Let me purify my thoughts and words and deeds That I may be a vehicle for Thee... Give me my rapture today.