Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
It's not like I had a breakdown, though it kind of felt like it at the time. I agreed to everything that happened. You can't really be at work and be like, "That's it. I've had too much. I'm going home."
The situation in America is when it starts moving there, all the bands from England move over to America and work from there, so that they're available all the time for everyone that wants them in person.
There are still many places I haven't seen that I'd like to travel to. I've never seen the Pyramids, and I'd love to explore the culture in North India. I think walking in the Andes would also be awesome.
It could be seen as narcissistic to have your own museum, but for me, it's such a long time ago - I have perspective. That young man in the funny clothes - he's almost a stranger, so I can tell his story.
My stepfather is a baron. He has a castle in Belgium that's been in his family for hundreds and hundreds of years. It's not fancy; it's really sort of brimstone and dark. It's got a moat and a drawbridge.
Other than my Instagram - very recently - I'm not out there. I'm not in the papers every week, I've managed to curb all that. I've never turned up at a party just to be snapped. It's not my kind of thing.
It's hard for people to see how they can change how dismal things look, but there are still wonderful things to sing about. Music is the only way we are capable of talking about the most important things.
I had a few dating disasters along the way with girls cheating on me. One girl was the inspiration for me singing 'Cry Me A River' on 'The X Factor.' That was my payback to her because she was unfaithful.
When I was born, I was effectively dead. Weird, I know. The doctors couldn't get any reaction from me, so I had to be brought round, and although it seemed like I was okay, there were underlying problems.
I don't force it. If you don't have an idea and you don't hear anything going over and over in your head, don't sit down and try to write a song. You know, go mow the lawn...My songs speak for themselves.
Dear Sir: I will wish to establish my name as the best Ethiopian songwriter. But I am not encouraged in undertaking this as long as 'The Old Folks At Home' stares me in the face with another's name on it.
I do have a way of playing piano where it's very melodic and emotional, but then often it's great if whoever's singing doesn't sing exactly what's in the piano melody, but maybe it's connected in some way.
I think one of the pitfalls of doing your own music is that sometimes you can never be satisfied with it: you're afraid to say that it's done, and you keep reworking it or re-recording it or re-writing it.
People like Clyde McPhatter who came out of the black churches - like Sam Cooke and Aretha Franklin - were all church singers who became great pop singers because gospel singing is very close to the blues.
I'm a big vinyl listener, I'm a big audiophile. I have a really nice stereo set up at home with a hi-fi and really nice turntable and it's a big deal to me to listen to music in it's purest form like that.
That's part of your life lesson to be afraid. The bigger question is how you deal with being afraid. Do you have to summon courage or something else to live with that fear without letting it take you over?
What I had to learn from Kim is how to take more of her advice and less of other people's advice. There's a lot of Kim K skills that were added. In order to win at life, you need some Kim K skills, period.
Hopefully, one day I won't have to be so caught up in all of that day-to-day, the Twitter and the Instagram. But I also would like to, at some point, turn off and take a break and also be, like, an artist.
I had a lot of jobs before I got into music. When I was 15, I was a copy boy for the 'Evening Chronicle' in Newcastle. Then I was a journalist. I value those experiences - I got to see how the world works.
[ Vietnam War] brought the people together and made the '60s like they were. The youth were very unified against the status quo - against the old line and the new old line. It's the same exact thing today.
With comedy, the jokes will come out, and people will see them coming. Changes in daily life or current events can change the consciousness of audiences and can make the show less funny or feel more stale.
Worship is about something we do. It involves sacrifice. But at the heart of the gospel is this truth, we are called and chosen by God to join in with the dance of the trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
It's this funny thing now: You sign up to be a musician because you want to write music, but you don't spend your time writing music. Instead, you go around the world selling the music you've already made.
From the very beginning, we just sort of made things up together. That's one of the great things about having a twin brother; you have a sort of feedback loop, where you can bounce things off of each other.
When I was 10, I would hear songs like "I Love You Always Forever" by Donna Lewis on the radio, and I want to make stuff that a 10 year old might hear coming out of the radio and think, "Yeah! I love this!"
I was born in New York, but I grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut - that's where I went to school. I remember begging my way into choir in the 3rd grade, because you're not supposed to get in until 4th grade.
The distance thing is partially due to the fact that I'm pretty shy and I've struggled with extreme stage fright in the past. So I just have to go onstage in a different head space so I'm not as self-aware.
For a bit I was going mad trying to do martial arts twice a week and go to the gym and do weights, but that can make you ill if you balance it with flying around and living like I do, so I narrowed it down.
If of these United States I was the President,No man that owed another should ever pay a cent;And he who dunn'd another should be banished far away,And attention to the pretty girls is all a man should pay.
Man, just tryin' to get as much sleep as possible, to drink in water, and tryin' to make sure that my people give me the proper information to be able to get in front of people and speak. That's all I need.
Do I worry about being in the public eye and raising kids? Yeah. Any situation you're in, you're gonna worry about raising kids. But it's champagne problems, too. There are people who can't feed their kids.
My idea of making time for myself is writing songs. I never stop beating myself up about trying to be productive, so I don't really like to do a lot of things other than write in my journal and write songs.
Most people know my music based on the singles, and think of it as scandalously romantic. There's definitely a romantic vibe, but I often sing things that are very direct. I don't beat around the bush much.
Pablo Picasso said, "Art is the lie that tells the truth," and it's not a terribly radical statement. It's always been that you can tell truth through fiction. And this idea also comes from nuclear physics.
I got to a really dark place when it came to wanting to be tanned, really disliking my natural skin tone. I was listening to the wrong people and all sorts of people were passing judgement on my appearance.
Most of the time I wind up with a sleepily mumbled melodic line, sometimes with words, sometimes not. But then with my waking brain I have to decide whether it's worth...I mean, sometimes it's not worth it.
A band has a certain responsibility to work songs for years and stick to rules more. A solo artist can just do whatever they want, and also present themselves as somebody who's just singing about their life.
Sometimes you might get inspired by something, write about it, then later that lyrics sounds better on another beat. That's happened a few times. Like 'Dance Wiv Me' - those lyrics didn't start on that beat.
I'd much rather speak up and stand behind something I believe in than worry about pissing off a couple hundred people. And if they're more pissed off than if I never said anything, well, sorry but not sorry.
The feather was a thing, when I was a kid, we used to find feathers around the house, and whenever we found them, my mum used to say it was my nan leaving them around for us to find, so that was quite sweet.
There's a part of me that wishes I'd never said one single solitary word on any subject publicly. Then I could have been the tortured poet, and there's so much mileage in that. But it's too late to stop now.
Now that that album's done [TModern Vampires of the City], I have time to revisit things that I was working on earlier, previous to it. I actually found it very helpful to be working on some music on my own.
You want the personality of each performer - whether it's singing or bass or drums or piano - to be intact. In some ways it's much more challenging to preserve that and to also make music that sounds modern.
The men's dance style in dancehall is territorial, but it's also flirtatious and it's also showing off strength by way of smooth movement that you can only do if you're really strong. It has so much attitude.
You should listen to songs and listen to what works. Listen to why a song is a hit. Check it out-not to imitate it, but there are certain things that work-hooks and melodies. Hear what works through the ages.
When we're in trouble, it's usually a line from a song that saves us. I wish it was sermons, but, I'm sorry, it's not. When you're in crisis, what comes to mind is 'O love that would not let me go.' You know?
I guess anybody who plays can say that they play guitar, but if you want to be a guitarist, you've got to practice all the time and you've got to get good at it. It's more than just having one and playing it.
I wanna tell the whole world about a friend of mine / This little light of mine, I'm feelin' let it shine / I'm feelin' take y'all back to them better times/ I'm feelin' talk about my mama if y'all don't mind
I ain't here to argue about his facial features. Or here to convert atheists into believers. I'm just trying to say the way school need teachers the way Kathie Lee needed Regis that's the way yall need Jesus.
I think in the industry we're in and the type of audience we have, we're never going to escape the idea of being young. Which I don't mind myself. I mean, who wants to grow up anyway? I don't want to grow up.