Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
The independent project, in a general way, requests a constant work to spread, in the traditional way and in the alternative circuit. It is a fight... but I believe that it is the way.
When church is over and there's no one there to listen except the only One who matters, do you still have that same passionate joy in your spirit, just to be alone with the Living God?
I think people need to live their lives the way they want to, but I'm pretty confident in the fact that I love girls. I've got a long line of girls who could testify that I am not gay.
I used to produce years ago when I feel like. I produced myself, Bounty Killer. That was the first set. Then I did a Bounty Killer, Lexxus, Spragga Benz, Sizzla, a whole lot of artist.
We will go on tour, that will be a boost for me. After that I can focus on LaToya. If I didn't have them, so many people would be coming at me right now and I wouldn't know what to do.
Reba McEntire came through town when I lived in Texas. She had this amazing theatrical show with, like, 13 different wardrobe changes. I was eight and I was like, Wow, I wanna do that!
Songwriting wasn't my gift. I think you have to cultivate a gift; you have to practice and develop craft around your gift so that you can execute it in more convenient, efficient ways.
I used to work at my dad's peanut mill, and worked 15 hours a day, 6 days a week. So, now, riding around on a nice tour bus and doing shows, you'd have to get picky to have a downside.
[ If I wasn't making music ] I'd probably end up going to school, I never went to school. Or just give up and get my plumber's ticket and move back to Edmonton and become an alcoholic.
A person with grace is somebody who's socially graceful or is a classy person, but sometimes you just feel the opposite of that, and you just feel like a jerk and a loser and a weirdo.
The same song can have drastically different feels and personalities just by changing some minor things. A different drumbeat or some vocal overdub could completely transform the song.
I was thinking about hitting races and stuff, but it's just, I think it's more of the era of when I was a kid and it just brings back memories. I gotta just chill and live in the past.
I think that any female who gets asked if she's a feminist... it's silly... it's so interesting when people ask females if they're a feminist. Of course every female wants to be equal!
I wanted to play my original music, but it was really hard because a lot of the people who would come out to the shows found out about me through 'The Voice' and wanted to hear covers.
My father is a university professor so when the schools needed a little kid for their productions I was often the kid they used. The first time I was ever on stage was about 2nd grade.
I thought, 'Oh that's what happens. You put a song out and everyone likes it.' Well, then a funny thing happened: I started putting more songs out, and none of them did the same thing.
Belafonte sent his people to pick me up and I went back and shook his hand, then went back to my little flat. I was very happy to have met a president of the United States - little me!
I have a friend who does everything, travels all over the world, goes everywhere, and he says that no matter where in the world he's been, it never gets any better than having a child.
The worst thing about that kind of prejudice... is that while you feel hurt and angry and all the rest of it, it feeds you self-doubt. You start thinking, perhaps I am not good enough.
I love the classics but there are many new ideas to be made into reality. I'd rather be concerned with my own thing. There are many masters of classical piano so I'll leave it to them.
By the time I was eight I was taking classical piano lessons and I wanted to be a concert pianist. But that didn't work out. I graduated from high school and my formal education ended.
Early detection is key," she said. "And if I hadn't found my lump early, I don't know what would have been. I am still here and I want to encourage women to do that on a regular basis.
The movies television and music we used to produce created an image of America that the world envied... now the millions around the world call us the Great Satan - and with good cause.
Whether I am or am not a Communist is irrelevant. The question is whether American citizens, regardless of their political beliefs or sympathies, may enjoy their constitutional rights.
I came along and was a teenager in the Depression, and nobody had jobs. So I went out hitchhiking, when I met a man named Woody Guthrie. He was the single biggest part of my education.
I've written songs for Shirley Bassey, Marianne Faithfull, and Linda Thompson. I sort of focus on these wonderful, aging divas. But maybe that's because I think I'm Christina Aguilera.
Putting all of my time In learning to care And a bucket of rhymes I threw up somewhere Want a locket of who Made me lose my perfunctory view Of all that is around And of all that I do.
I tasted huge success with my first album, and when it's happening it feels like a roller coaster you can't get off. You should be very careful about wishing for success on that scale.
There are days when I swear I could fly like an eagle And dark desperate hours that nobody sees My arms stretched triumphant on top of the mountain My head in my hands down on my knees
I made a conscious decision that I was not going to have children. I didn't want others raising them, and looking after them myself would get in the way of being a musician and writer.
I hadn't known anything else, other than being an artist, and I needed to be a person for a while, really get to know myself without that whole thing [of selling music] surrounding me.
There's just enough drinking and cheating songs around without me adding to them. Unless you've got something better than "Misery and Gin" by Merle Haggard, you're beating a dead horse.
In China, I realized that if you visit often enough and learn the language, you will be assimilated, but you'll still be kept at arm's length; you'll always be looked on as a foreigner.
As a child, I went to peace and ERA marches on the back of my mom and grandmother. Through them I learned that I wanted to find a way to make the world a more kind, compassionate place.
I didn't realize until I was older what a huge music fan my daddy really was, and actually that my grandma played banjo at one time, and I didn't even know that until a year or two ago.
The minute I spend any energy defending myself, explaining myself, or in the worst case scenario, trying to please those who are criticizing me, I will, you know, just fall off a cliff.
I respect the people who buy my records and come to my concerts. It's only fair that I always try to give them the very best that's in me. After all, I need them more than they need me.
With Kevin [Drew], as I said, in his own way just told me "You gotta find that person that talks to you in your songs." I think we succeeded. I feel relief, to be quite honest with you.
Being a businessman, you want to invest your time and your heart into growth and a legacy, and sometimes it's about going over there and getting it. But you don't have to lose yourself.
When a person finds life hard, he needs motivation and inspiration; but if he finds life’s journey easy, then he needs meditation and introspection to know the true quality of his life.
Those things don't happen today. I feel sorry for the kids in the industry today. They have on sunglasses, eat caviar in jet planes, but they'll never know the true feeling that we did.
But just as I was ready to call it quits, I got the necessary money from a third party, who had been instructed by Bing to help me out, without letting me know where the help came from.
Never say that your life is to be a singer. You want to sing because it's a part of your life. But if you don't succeed as a singer, it doesn't mean you don't have a life and it's over.
Until MTV, television had not been a huge influence on music. To compete with MTV, the country music moguls felt they had to appeal to the same young audience and do it the way MTV did.
I didn't want to be told what to do. I don't want to water down my music to fit into their formats. I know what rock and roll is to me, but everything's turning into one big commercial.
You used to have to sing and convey emotion, and now, well, technically you can do anything with technology. It sucks for music today, but that's why that old music feels so good to me.
People feel so much more comfortable bullying behind a screen than in person. It gives them a mystique and makes them say things that they would never be strong enough to say in person.
The very first time I came to The States I came right to New York and I remember walking around Times Square, I saw a couple of shows and I thought, 'I'd love to come here and do this.'
Records have always been the most extraordinary form of time travel for me, and that's why it matters to know when something was circulated, and if it had an audience of five or 50,000.
Honestly, I sleep best wearing nothing. But with kids, I've learned to sleep with underwear very close by, if not wrapped around one of my feet, so I'm ready to go if something happens.