Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
You might be a legend one day if you just keep your head to the ground and never get overzealous and start thinking you've outdone yourself. That's the space I try to stay in.
If I ever get some free time I end up thinking about what to make next. I don't pick up a guitar and start playing the songs I already know; I immediately try to write a riff.
I'm expressin' with my full capabilities, And now I'm livin in correctional facilities. Cause some don't agree with how I do this, I get straight and meditate like a Buddhist.
I think it would be stupid for us to try and tell people who are dancing in a discotheque about the problems of the world. That is the very thing they have come away to avoid.
I am not so complicated or intelligent a composer, nor am I very interested in becoming so. I am much more happy doing what I know I can do than what I am not sure I could do.
Once you figure out what your own thing is it's all about trying to develop shows, programs that can, I guess, enhance what you already have and what you can add to Hollywood.
When you go to a movie, you don't care for one Oscar, really. Do you care if a guy got a Oscar on the shelf or is it a good movie? And, you don't care how much the movie made.
Twerking has to end. Not for the ones that look good doing it, but for all the ones that you feel, 'You don't have enough to twerk back there. Your twerkin' look like jerkin.'
I got a scholarship to Seattle University and I was writing arrangements for singers and everybody. But the music course was too dry and I really wanted to get away from home.
I've always wanted to be mentioned in the same sentence or at the same time that you say Quincy Jones or you say Stevie Wonder. I never thought that could possibly ever happen.
I stand by my record. I did some sharp things to get things right - too harsh - but a lot was at stake. But at the end of the day, what have I got? Just a successful Singapore.
I'm proud by not being frustrated, jealous or too confused by remaining creative. It's very easy to give up, and to keep going and sticking to your own ethos is very difficult.
I think [director] Malcolm Lee is a real master at being able to make you laugh while bringing serious subject-matter, so the movie doesn't hinge on silliness, but on real life.
Music has done a lot to enhance the emotions of sports. It's played in arenas. Whenever there is footage cut together they're always using music. And it goes together, you know.
Def Jam, they've shown nothing but love as far as supporting my records. We haven't missed yet, radio-wise, and every song that they've actually tried to support has been No. 1.
This was a result of a number of factors, but we do know that the messages kids get about the harms of drugs has a significant impact on their decision on whether or not to use.
Rhythm and blues is about what life is, it's about being able to talk heartbreak and understanding that people go through it, not about this fantasy in how much you're spending.
The relationship with a producer and an artist is really special. It's got to be love and respect, amazing mutual respect for each other, because that's what makes a good record.
Fortunately I own a vintage brain, and I am alive and well in the 21st century, still making records, still working at an intense pace and most of all, still having fun doing it.
A mother isn't someone who does it on purpose; mothers are who they are, and just by existing, they affect the way other people negotiate with the environment and with themselves.
I always say that as church falls into demise, we still have the inclination to congregate whether by a night of music or a festival, or just sitting down to listen to some vinyl.
When you work with Ray Charles, Billy Eckstine and Frank Sinatra, and you tell them to jump without a net, you better know what you're talking about. Thank God I was ready for it.
Bottom line: Black men like curves. When they're crooning to women about how beautiful they are in an R&B song, the ladies you see in the video don't reflect what those guys like.
I'd really like to do a movie, either as a producer or director. My ultimate fantasy would be to direct a movie and produce the entire soundtrack. I don't really see myself acting.
Nothing against Nicki Minaj - I think she's a dope lyricist, and her body is perfect, along with a dope personality. But I'm more into a woman who's not so much into the spotlight.
There were many stars in Motown's firmament - among them, Stevie, Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson, Martha Reeves and Diana Ross - but I happen to have loved the Four Tops most of all.
We stole a box of honey jars one time and went out in the woods and took care of the whole box. I don't think I touched honey again for 20 years. I never wanted to see honey again.
When I was about five or seven years old my mother was placed in a mental institution and so we were with our father who worked very hard, and we had to figure a lot of things out.
I never envisioned being number one for five weeks, knocking Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men off the charts. That's the scariest thing and the greatest thing that ever happened to me.
After 'Return Of The Bumpasaurus' in '96, I just got away from music for, like, a year. Literally, I think I produced two songs in a year. I was totally kicking it, running around.
I'm in prison. But my heart and mind is free. Gangsta haters on the streets are doing more time than me. They need 30 police escorts with them every time they walk down the street.
I'm an entertainer, so in whatever form I entertain... The thing about being a rapper is that you have more control over your form, whereas with acting you have to compromise a lot.
I was raised in Chicago and I guess that was one of the special breeding grounds for gangsters of all colors. That was the Detroit of the gangster world. The car industry was thugs.
I'm usually writing or producing for other people. I'm like Burger King most of the time; I let people have it their way like "You want it like this? I'll give it to you like this."
It's not for me to determine what a country artist has in common with a hip-hop artist. You go for those with long-lasting careers. And that's what I've had as my target all my life.
I've worked with everyone from Ice Cube to Snoop Dogg ... right across to working with pop stars like Justin Timberlake. Why those artists came to me is because they wanted my sound.
My proudest accomplishment is my daughter Ella. Because she is a great person, great personality. She not really my accomplishment, she is her own, but I had something to do with it.
Being onstage and communicating with an audience was part of my life since I was very little, but I was never pushed into singing. My parents were so uninterested in me making music.
It wasn't easy for me to socialize with other kids when I got back from touring. I felt different. Like we all do, but I didn't feel like I got all the codes. I was a little awkward.
I'm gonna make sure everybody get their justice. This the year for business, this the year for my book, this the year for the movie and this the year for getting even. I'm on my way.
I'm a vulnerable guy, which is always been there, you know? Like, most of the time I put myself in positions where I am vulnerable, because I don't think you're living unless you do.
They wanna hang us, see us dead, or enslave us, keep us trapped in the same place we raised in. Then they wonder why we act so outrageous, run around stressed out and pull out gauges.
To me, it's my job not to laugh, no matter what's said. By the time we shoot, I'm ready for all that's coming. I probably do most of my breaking in rehearsals, when I know that I can.
While I had done the movies through Revolution Studios, we own the sitcom. It was a situation where, once the team was assembled, I knew we could create something really, really good.
When you become famous super young, you learn how to behave by the rules because you're the one that has to take the stress. But that also creates a barrier that I really didn't want.
Money affects everything, from who I'm with to what label I'm on, so everything I do now is about protecting it. But I didn't understand how powerfully that would affect my home life.
My father had a brilliant scholastic record in high school and was awarded a college scholarship. Unfortunately he had to turn it down so that he could continue to support his family.
I guess now music is so saturated and so microwaved. It's, like, 15 minutes in the microwave and boom, you've got something. Nobody's putting passion or any thought behind it anymore.
When I was about 13, and I would write in my journal, I'd be like, 'I just watched 'Spice World,' the Spice Girls movie, and I loved it.' Sometimes I would sign them with the name Xen.
I had fun doing it, but acting ain't really my thing. I am more of a production/director type. I would rather be behind the scenes and organizing and putting things together like that.