Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I think that because we have these big female pop stars, people forget that women and marginalized people are so underrepresented in this business.
Music spoke to me when I was young in such an intimate, empowering, magical way, and I think that music is already doing that for young queer kids.
The one time I shot a gun, the feelings I felt, I was guilty for feeling them. There is an exhilaration and a glamour, and I felt awful for feeling that.
Obviously, Gaga's one of the greatest music visionaries of our time, and Beyonce is one of the greatest visions of our time. She is a music visionary, too.
I feel like there is a lot of homophobia and misogyny in the music business, and I feel like I've gotten to a place where I've broken down a lot of those doors.
I've had the experience of going through homophobia in my work, and I can share my experiences so future generations don't have to deal with what I've dealt with.
When I'm in a session with an artist, my job is to help execute their vision - so it's whatever story they're telling, and the news doesn't specifically affect that.
I shot a gun one time in New Zealand. An entertainment news program there thought, since the band was called Semi Precious Weapons, they would bring us to a gun range.
I've experienced some really very obvious, direct homophobia - when I was still trying to be an artist, behind the scenes, being told to be less gay, be less feminine.
I'm fortunate that I have a female publisher, and her boss is a man of color. My world is a little more diverse, but the majority of the business is not diverse at all.
If you think of 'Chandelier,' Sia's singing her heart out about all those moments before she got sober, and that's one way to convey emotion and make people hear every word.
For me, as a kid desperate to make music, I thought the only way I could do it was to try to be a superstar - which is a fun thing to be, but it can be exhausting and degrading.
A couple of days working with Joe Jonas, I thought, 'This guy is a slayer of a singer; he's really funny, goofy, and sexy. We need to write that.' And that led to 'Cake By The Ocean.'
I like to play this game where I ask people to count gay pop writers and producers they know. Everyone's always like, 'Oh, there are plenty!' But we always end up counting them on one hand.
For me personally, I'm anti-gun and always have been and always will be. But I'm definitely not someone who is looking to abolish the Second Amendment. I think we're definitely interpreting it wrong.
If you listen to Semi-Precious Weapons' last single, 'Aviation High,' you can definitely hear that even in my old band, even in the songs I was writing then, the pop influence really started to take over.
Once I got into pop songwriting, I was kind of just ready to help other people tell their stories... I'm here to facilitate and structure and grow and make things a little more fabulous and a little more urgent.
The thing is, if you tell your story specifically enough, it becomes so universal. Just because you're a gay man singing an honest love song, people should know that it's about men and that they can still relate to it.
I worked at a jewelry store to pay the bills when I first moved to N.Y.C., and I always loved the phrase 'Semi Precious.' So I wanted to just call the band Semi Precious, but my dad told it was kinda sissy, so I added Weapons.
Young women should be telling stories of other young women. And if the superstar who is an amazing storyteller isn't a writer, that's totally fine, but we should get a young female writer in the room to work on that song with us.
The beauty of letting marginalized people tell their own stories is it isn't only the right thing to do socially, but it's also the right thing to do financially. People love the truth, and people like to spend money on the truth.
People are always quick to judge SPW because of the fact that I wear heels. For me, I just have no choice. This is just how I feel beautiful and how I feel awesome. I would just be so uncomfortable onstage if I was wearing something else.
You can tell if something feels special. But there are so many moving parts involved in making the song a hit. The radio has to deliver, the management has to deliver in terms of booking the right promotions... just being a good song isn't enough.
Great music is just very clear. Sonically and lyrically, you understand the point of view, you understand the melodies, you understand the vibe, and you understand the lyric pretty damn quickly. To me, that doesn't make it 'less than' - it makes it 'more than.'
When we were starting out as a band in New York, we played a concert at a small club early on and asked Lady Gaga to open for us. We were big fans, and she had the same kind of approach to music as we did: not taking everything so seriously and just having fun.
I didn't want a day job anymore, so I somehow made the jewelry line work. Now that I look back on it, it was, like, the dumbest idea ever. Everyone and their mother has a jewelry line, so in retrospect, maybe not the smartest fallback plan. But it ended up working out great!
In every school, there's always the kid who gets it the worst, and I was, for sure, that kid. Every time you had to get in a line that was boys and girls, it was like my worst nightmare. A lot of kids I know got made fun of for being gay; that was not my issue: I was just called a girl endlessly.
A lot of writers don't know what it feels like to get on stage. They don't understand the weight that songs can carry. I got a chance to play all these shows. I got a chance to define myself through music, so when it comes to helping other people figure out what they should say, I've been through it.
Gaga the person is much like Gaga the celebrity. She is very sweet, loyal, and funny with her fans, and she is very sweet, loyal, and funny with her friends. On stage, she is over-the-top, ridiculous, dirty, and genuine on stage, and she is very over-the-top, ridiculous, dirty, and genuine with her friends.
I really do pride myself on being able to help other people tell their stories and bring out the best in them. But I still, every song I'm writing, I still need to relate to it. I still need to find my true self in it, or else it'll feel dishonest. I mean, everything has a queer meaning as far as I'm concerned.
I first fell in love with music when I was five years old because of 'Annie.' And then 'The Little Mermaid' really made me want to start singing. And then the fierce, amazing women of the '90s - Alanis Morrissette, Courtney Love, Tori Amos, Ani Difranco, Paula Cole, Patty Griffin - made me want to start writing.
I was born into the most amazing family an underdog could be born into, and I was born into the LGBTQ community. And what a beautiful community we are. The art, the music, the fashion, the brains, the fight, the survival skills, the diversity, male, female, non-binary, Gender Non Conforming, cis, trans, femme, and all races.
I love to give the song away - it's so exciting - where, I think, a lot of younger songwriters, they struggle with that. And it's a big struggle, where they want the shine and they want people to know that it was their idea and it was their doing. But luckily, I've been through that, so I can just focus on helping other people do their thing.