Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
There's a lot of craft that goes into achieving a hit song - at the beginning of your career, you're usually more inspiration than craft, and you get great when those intersect. A skilled songwriter can get you to that intersection.
I remember I had an actor friend - a close friend from college - Anthony Zerbe. He sent me a telegram before I started my first movie, 'Cisco Pike.' It said, 'Have a good time. Ignore the camera.' That was the extent of my training.
Sugarland was a band we started to try to make things better. It was in the aftermath of 9-11; it was in the aftermath of my mother dying... there was a lot of weird stuff that had gone on that made you want to start something good.
I've learned recently to love imperfection a lot because it shines such a big light on God's grace. And if someone has grace for you that's when you feel their love the most and they see you for who you are and they love you anyway.
Sometimes, love feels like a life or death situation. Losing true love is pretty much as bad as it gets, other than actually dying or losing good health. Most people know that. Most people can relate. It's like the end of the world.
I wrote these words for everyone who struggles in their youth. Who won't accept deception instead of what is truth. It seems we lose the game, before we even start to play. Who made these rules? We're so confused. Easily led astray.
I loved you when you opened like a lily to the heat; you see I’m just another snowman standing in the rain and sleet who loved you with his frozen love, his second hand physique, with all he is and all he was a thousand kisses deep.
When I grew up we had gym at school, two or three dance classes after school, ice skating lessons, and all sorts of sports at our finger tips. We weren't glued to computers because they didn't exist, so being active was all we knew.
I was really skinny and I had greasy hair and I was knock-kneed. There's something still in me that's like that, and I catch myself, you know when you're walking or something, and you think, 'Oh no, you're still that drippy person.'
Musicians like James Blake were a big influence on me. How he uses his vocals is amazing. And then Yeasayer and Animal Collective, who aren't pop bands exactly, but they do something that is so catchy and undeniable and so much fun.
It's just the more you do it the better you get, or at least that's how I feel in my case. I think it's a combination of confidence and just having done it this long and just learning. I'm always learning. I'm still honing my craft.
I'm somebody who doesn't feel the need to be in the driver's seat all the time. I appreciate the perspective of being in the passenger's seat sometimes, and I feel fortunate for that because I've learned a lot from that perspective.
I think I enjoyed witnessing Robin [Williams] and John play off each other really well, even just joking around in between takes and stuff. I just got to stand back with the crew and be entertained and watch the show in front of me.
Divorce is not an issue. That's people's lives! So, I don't like to be too puffed up about the importance of family. It's going to be tough and it changes as time goes by. I don't know. I just don't think it should be made an issue.
I just love where I am right now in my career. I love country music. I don't ever feel restricted by the genre. I've been able to have a solid career that we've built one step at a time and a family. I know that I'm in a good place.
I won't complain about touring, because I really do believe that a public-figure musician complaining about being a public-figure musician is just absurd. Like, 'Boo hoo hoo! I have to stand on stage and people pay attention to me!'
What fascinates me about addiction and obsessive behavior is that people would choose an altered state of consciousness that's toxic and ostensibly destroys most aspects of your normal life, because for a brief moment you feel okay.
If you and I become vegans, the global consequences aren't going to be that much. But if we can get a few hundred million people to become a little more aware and cut back on their animal consumption, the consequences will be great.
A lot of time we don't get into politics because we don't believe anything you're saying and we can't understand what you're saying because we ask you question and you tap dance around the issue so much that we forget what we asked.
I remember really bonding with the first generation kids, the Chinese Canadian kids, and in high school bonding with the Latin kids and the East Indian kids. It was very interesting because it made me open to lots of musical sounds.
What's sometimes really overwhelming in Sweden is the uniformity. People kind of disappear by all looking the same and wearing the same clothes. There are a lot of great individuals, but it can become a very blank and bleak picture.
I get really excited about collaborating because by the end of the day you have something that you never thought you'd have. I was really happy about writing "Bad News" and a bunch of other stuff on the record that came out so well.
My most important inspirational job that I do is raising those kids. That's my job. And that's where my ambition goes. But I have a life. I'm not only their mother. I'm still who I was before, I just don't get to be it all the time.
When you have children your life - this is my job and that's my life. So it's a totally different thing. They're my priority, they have to be, and they always will be. I have to do them first. So this always gets pushed in the back.
I was like one of the boys in school who flap their legs frantically under the desk. I always had this weird feeling between my legs and I had no idea what it was. I didn't know girls masturbated. I never touched myself or anything.
New generations have unprecedented power to make great changes. Take the music business for example. The new generations have toppled the music industry by file sharing, downloading, and Myspace. Rock 'n' roll belongs to the people.
I was in musical comedy. And I did very well, but the memorization killed me. I'm not good at memorizing, and it gave me a lot of anxiety. I hated the makeup. I hated all that pancake makeup. I didn't really like dressing for parts.
I think behind every great man there's got to be a great woman, whether she's your wife, your girlfriend or not. I'm not gonna say that there's not that special girl out there. But I'm in the music biz, and I'm focused on the music.
R. Kelly is an image, a brand. That's my job. There's a whole other side of me that's Robert, who is a father, a friend. But then I put on the game face and go into the studio and do the music. That's just another day at the office.
So, we come out to Los Angeles. And we met with every network. We met with show runners, directors, writers, everything. And what we had an idea for, they didn't like. And what they had an idea for, we didn't like. So, we went home.
I loved things like Destiny's Child, and Amy Winehouse's first record came out when I was 11 years old. But as a young, young child, I was just surrounded by Stevie Wonder, Whitney Houston, Chaka Khan - just massive, soulful voices.
I don't eat meat, fish, or eggs. I was never a big meat-eater, but I've got more energy now. I eat a lot of tofu, and I drink soy shakes with fruit every morning. I always have soybeans, black beans, or chickpeas for lunch or dinner
My paternal grandfather, when he was in the army in World War II - he was over in the South Pacific, and he thought he was gonna die. And he wrote a letter to my grandmother and their newborn son, thinking he wasn't gonna come home.
I'm usually more concerned with how things sound than how they look on the page. Some people write for the page, and that's a whole other thing. I'm going for what it sounds like right away, so it may not even look good on the page.
The fact that religion plays such a part in how people vote troubles me, troubles me as a minister's daughter. Because I always felt that the separation of church and state was what our forefathers and foremothers really fought for.
Well I've got to get out of the rat-race now I'm tired of the ways of mice and men And the empires all turning into rust again. Out of everything nothing remains the same That's why I'm cloud hidden Cloud hidden Whereabouts unknown.
It's the same thing as a primitive of Africans, Indians, nomads or whatever - when they start getting up and doing their ritual and doing the dance, it's just what's coming through. It's the spirit. Rock 'n' roll is still primitive.
I think the responsibility of pop stars is to liberate the masses. In that everyone can be whatever they wanna be. You can march to your own beat. It's so hard sometimes in our country because conformity is the way things are pushed.
The more nervous I am, and the more insane a situation is, the more I love it and get addicted to it. That's why I love playing on stage. And I kind of freak out if I don't get to do it, because it's a big part of my sanity, I think.
I think sometimes since we have so much technology today it's easy to overproduce things and perfect things in a way that's not really natural, and I've always really gravitated toward imperfections and just the essence of the thing.
I feel that there is a culture being built that is a celebration of agony. There is also a celebration of being an outcast, to the degree that you are segregating yourself in a negative way from people who may want to be your friend.
I don't want any injustice brought against the bullies. Bullies just don't know any better. Anyone who is crying about police brutality or victimization as an adult needs to stop it and realize the privileges we have in this country.
I have a memory of listening to Tracy Chapman and just being intrigued by her voice. Even as a young girl, I wanted to know more about her and her story. I felt I was learning about her through her music. That was a revelation to me.
We wanted to be successful, we wanted to shoot a video. We just wrote a song and we were like, 'OK, let's go onstage! Let's shoot a video for it!' That was always our dream... We just wanted to have fans and a crowd who would listen.
I just start playing music and eventually I sing something, a line of a verse or a B section or a line of a chorus, and the line that I end up singing is related to the music I'm playing, if that makes any sense. And I go from there.
For me with "The Apprentice," it kind of blew out my business brain. I don't really think of myself as a business person. I think of myself more as a creative-type person, but it's quite nice to be challenged physically and mentally.
The physical thing of having a man following you around all day trying to take your photograph - it's eerie. There is a pure physical response. If you go up and kick a dog, it will bite you. But with photographers, you can't do that.
I think Washington, in general, is dysfunctional. I think it's high time we put people in Congress who were not beholden to their party, and not beholden to anything but the people who they live around and grew up around, in my case.
Each song is a small universe to me. Each song has a story of its own. Each has a full life to express in order to be complete, so it often happens that the building to a big crescendo feels right in the recording or writing process.
When you think of bike couriers, you think of hyper speed. They get paid by how fast they can drop stuff off. The faster you go, the more chances you take. And the more chances you take, the greater the war between cyclists and cars.