Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I've always been "other." I've always felt odd; I have always felt foreign in the environment I've been in. When you are young, that is a really uncomfortable thing to feel. As an older woman I really embrace it.
I was a real serious kid, real intense, and there were a lot of things that I was doing by myself I took seriously, like organizing little pieces of paper, cutting out things from magazines, and filing them away.
There is no alternative. A Democrat is a Republican is a big businessman, and we're all consumers instead of citizens. It just manifests in the culture, in the music, in the art. I feel a little panicky about it.
I've been vegetarian since the 80s and, lately, even vegan. And I once happened to witness the slaughter of a cow. What atrocity must undergo an animal to satisfy the appetite of those fat men who eat hamburgers!
Fashion is a huge part of music and of who you are. It really sets the mood for a show, and it's fun to play around with it. You can get really creative in photo shoots as well. You know, just having fun with it.
'If I Should Love Again' - I was just so impressed with myself writing something like that. It wasn't a single and people didn't really know about it, but it's a beautiful song and that's part of what I'm loving.
These days, with 'American Idol' and all the other reality shows, young people become famous overnight, and that can be very difficult to handle, the way photographers follow you around and study your every move.
For me, a song doesn't really take flight until it has a lyric on it. ...Without a lyric that I'm happy with, it could be the greatest song ever melodically or arrangement-wise, but it doesn't have any resonance.
I went to school in Gainesville because it was a huge punk and folk town. So I went to class twice a week, and then I went to shows and wrote. I did a lot of music writing before I actually started playing music.
I try to imagine how we would live if we didn't know we were going to die. Would we live our lives differently? Less careful, maybe? Less scared? These are beautiful things to think about and build a song around.
I'd never done a straight play before, never, and it was very hard work - really, really hard work. It was dense, really wordy, and I was determined to learn every word of it - not just skip over bits and pieces.
Feminists bore me to death. I follow my instinct and if that supports young girls in any way, great. But I'd rather they saw it more as a lesson about following their own instincts rather than imitating somebody.
You know, a lot of people feel that sobriety is about just stopping using whatever it was that you appeared to be addicted to, but it really has to do with a way of looking at your life and taking accountability.
A lot of what I've been learning in the last two years is due to therapy - about my sexuality, why things go wrong, why relationships haven't worked. It isn't anything to do with anybody else; it's to do with me.
I feel like my career has always been a series of collisions and accidents. Being in the right place at the right time. Having the right haircut. It's so mad to think that it happened in the way that it happened.
I sit and I write automatically. I don't really try to write. My subconscious mind takes over and writes the songs for me. Songs come very easily for me. When I'm inspired, it takes me 20 minutes to write a song.
I'm always thirsty when I wake up, so I guzzle a bottle of Smart water before I scramble tofu with onions, peppers and spinach and top it with salsa. I've been a vegetarian for years, but I recently became vegan.
I'm not worried. I'm just so grateful to be in the position that I'm in. I'm just going with the flow right now, and I think my album will come together quite nicely because I think everybody is on the same page.
We're all too busy working, entertaining ourselves With forty hours, television and prescription pills Well, I take two a day to help my brain behave It never does, but who's to say? At least my doctor gets paid.
I hate going anywhere. I'm really excited to travel and play all these different places, but if I had it my way, I would stay inside, maybe go to the back garden or walk around the corner to the shops. That's it.
Mum, who had been a dancer with a small ballet company before she got married, was full of encouragement. She didn't say, "This is really good, you should do this", She just encouraged us to do whatever we liked.
Mum, who had been a dancer with a small ballet company before she got married, was full of encouragement. She didn't say, 'This is really good, you should do this', She just encouraged us to do whatever we liked.
Especially now, with 'Glee,' it's allowed a lot of kids to love music and performing at a young age. All ages watched 'American Idol,' but I think it was nice to be able to show kids, 'Hey, you can be here, too.'
When I went out and started making solo records, I was determined not to, I guess, put my name on an album that sounded like Styx. I wanted to carve my own niche, so quite frankly I went in a different direction.
You've got to be in a place where you can put your guard down. I've got a long list of things I consider to be selling out. But amongst that list, one of them is when you make art without putting your guard down.
If you gave me just a coin for every time we say goodbyeWell I'd be rich beyond my dreams, I'm sorry for my weary lifeI know I'm not perfect but I can smileand I hope that you see this heart behind my tired eyes.
All these fine Christian-type people that seem to think they know what God wants for all of us, that's certainly more of a sin then anything they would claim about us. To judge people is one of the greatest sins.
Quality is timeless: It will clearly define itself. And so I make reference to and acknowledge things that I feel have been dismissed, trying to restate those musical and cultural elements clearly and vehemently.
No matter how famous and established they were or however blessed they were with great songs or long careers, if they lived alone, they lived alone. That's not the way I wanted to live prior to the tour or after.
As soon as something becomes 'trendy,' I go off it. I hate the idea of being a sheep and just following a look because I've been told it's fashionable. Individuality makes the world a much more interesting place.
The moon upon the ocean is swept around in motion but without ever knowing the reason for its flowing in motion on the ocean the moon still keeps on moving the waves still keep on waving and I still keep on going
You have to be very careful how you insert new stuff, 'cause people want to hear the old stuff. It's like cooking, you know? You can't put too many peppers into the eggs... otherwise it's going to be distasteful.
We as Black people have to tell our own stories. We have to document our history. When we allow someone else to document our history the history becomes twisted and we get written out. We get our noses blown off.
People always say 'Etta, you know what your problem is? You're neither fish nor fowl. There is no place to rack you.' When I would go in a record shop, you might find one or two records by me in different stacks.
Twigs has been my nickname for years, and I guess a lot of people close to me called me Twigs, like, as a nickname. Before I even did dancing properly or anything, like, substantially creative, I was still Twigs.
You can't plan success with a creative field. So I enjoy it while it's here, and I know it won't be forever. Maybe one day I'll have to go back to flipping burgers, but for now I'm going to enjoy the cool things.
I don't imagine my parents are too excited about my kind of life. The surrounding weirdness bothers them. Still, I think they're pretty good. Their lives are based on what their friends think, just like ours are.
Songs are like my children, from the concept phase, to writing, to recording, then editing and all of the work that went into it and the millions of listens. Then you move away from it and you never see it again.
I do really silly dancing. I love dancing, but I'm not cool when I dance. It's not about my moves, it's not about how cool I am, it's not about how slick I look on the dance floor, it's about having a great time.
Go to the east shore of any of the Hawaiian Islands, and that's a pretty big lesson on how much plastic is ending up in the ocean. Basically, the Hawaiian Islands act as a filter out in the middle of the Pacific.
When I really started liking music was when I could play some of it myself, and after a couple of years of playing folk music, I kinda rediscovered those hits that were on the radio all the time when I was a kid.
Of course, I came up around music and fame, but this is still my first time experiencing it all. I'm still going through it like anybody else goes through it. But I'm still doing something I've never done before.
When I was at school, I wanted to play a piano, and they said, 'No, that's for the classical students.' There's always been this air around pianos, which can very often discourage a young person from having a go.
Rock music was the death of jazz in a way. I know there's a bunch of people who say jazz isn't dead, but I mean, rock 'n roll, you play three chords to 20,000 people; jazz, you play 20,000 chords to three people.
My favorite thing about going to concerts has always been looking around and thinking that theres a lot of people in here that are very much like me, a lot of people in here I could have a full conversation with.
Traveling has a major impact on what I do, cause all over the world I'm meeting all kinds of people. And relationships is the second major impact that I have. I just enjoy the variety that the world has to offer.
You can't kill the past by denying the past. You can kill it only by making it obsolete. And even in that, you have to find honor in the past. You can't hack off pieces of yourself, and expect them to grow again.
Electro '80s is very popular in Australia. Like, you get a headache if you walk into a mall with the number of girls and boys that are wearing big hair, leggings, headbands. You feel like you're back in the '80s.
Once you are successful, there's a very seductive rhythm at work that keeps you wanting to outdo yourself. By the end of 'Spirit' I felt like I didn't want to get into that trap. It almost makes you cartoon-like.
My son has godmothers, godfathers, grandparents and so many others in his life who love him as much as I do. They're there for both of us. I may not have a mate or husband, but I'm definitely not a single parent.