Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I've sort of realized there's a definite pattern to my output at this point: there's an album that everybody sort of loves, that's a real balance between the old and new, like The Dreamer or No Beginning No End, like a blend of jazz and hip-hop, or r&b and soul and hip-hop.
I had no problem with Ritchie. Ritchie and I never argued. We never had a problem. I think I was always able to write the things that he wanted - until he decided he wanted to be a pop star. And then he started doing pop music. And once he did that, that was the end for me.
I've played football with George Best, the greatest footballer that ever lived. That doesn't make me a footballer. And I've sung a duet with Pavarotti. That doesn't make me an opera singer. I can write and I have a story to tell, but I'm not going to make a career out of it.
Letting go does not mean pushing away or negating thoughts or feelings that come to us - but instead being with the feeling. We start to feel that we are no longer victims of the stuff that happens to us. There is something we can do about it... if we just take a look at it.
I have the most eclectic audience - I've got gay, I've got straight, black, white, rich, poor, young, old, in 45 countries. And they don't all come because I'm the Sinatra kid, though that's a big part of it. My biggest successes have come from pop songs that I write myself.
It [retirement] was absolutely boring. You can't go and say, 'I'm retired now. That's it!' It won't take long and you're really gone for good and someone throws the last shovel of dirt on a coffin with your name on it. That's the moment you're really retiring - when you die.
There was this large group of people that we were talking about on the first album - "The Youth" - but we didn't really know what to tell them. We still don't know what to tell them, but we want to make it seem like maybe there's something we know that they want to know, too.
I think play and joy and feeling good deserve more of our time. I don't see why adults are supposed to grow out of those things. If I have a mission it's to make everyone who comes to my concerts leave feeling a heightened sense of freedom to play, sing, and enjoy themselves.
I've always had musicianship as a dream since I was really small. I started to take it a bit more seriously when I learned how to write properly when I was 13 or 14. I saw it as a viable career option when I was 18. I thought, I'm going to start trying it and see how it goes.
Somebody said to me this morning, 'To what do you attribute your longevity?' I don't know. I mean, I couldn't have planned my life out better. By all accounts I should be dead! The abuse I put my body through: the drugs, the alcohol, the lifestyle I've lived the last 30 years!
I'm not practising, I don't go to church, but what I got from it was a sense of belonging to something bigger. What I really miss is being forced to be in a community with people that aren't the same as you. Then, you really have to work through the ways that you're different.
I sang 'Nessun Dorma' twice with Pavarotti, and he told me he'd heard 'Smoke' about five or six times, and every time was different. He was so jealous because if he deviated one jot from the traditional interpretation of the famous arias, he'd be crucified. We have the freedom.
The level of musicianship in New York is the highest in the world. It's tough to get into. You start gigging making 50 dollars a night, or playing for nothing to get to something. It's insane. It's like being a modern dancer, or something - the hardest thing to make money from.
We have to learn to love people even if they are not giving you what you want... and then not take it personally. If you feel hurt, you have to recognize that they are not hurting you because you are you, but because they are them. You have to try not to be so hard on yourself.
Jesus Christ was the original rock'n'roll star. He gave people reasons to live in the rut they were living in. He was the first man to say, "You don't have to have human sacrifices, 'cause human sacrifices hurt somebody, you know?" Just believe in the spirit that is within you.
I think, a lot of times, bands will break up because their goal is commercial success, and most bands aren't going to get that: it's out of their control. If you do, you're one of the lucky ones, but that commercial success will likely fade, and you'll end up breaking up anyway.
For the last 30 years, I've been leading a life of crime and international intrigue that's involved 40 stamps in my passport, love affairs, and broken hearts to go with each one of them. You would have to live three lifetimes to catch up with just the allegations that follow me!
Ya know, I always admired Ray Kroc, the man who invented McDonald's. Ray had a vision of the most commonplace thing - a hamburger and fries to go - but to him it was just the greatest thing ever, and he was going to make it the greatest thing ever for everybody else, and he did.
The infrastructure of today's computing environment is for good or ill structured around the Windows operating system. Can you get around that? Yes you can, but you have to work harder to do that and most individuals and most corporations are not going to make that extra effort.
I think a lot of people vote in fear. People like Donald Trump are good at casting this shadow of fear over people, making them believe if they don't vote for him then the terrorists are going to get them or whatever. All his ways are to scare people to vote for him. It's so sad.
I went to college for, like, a year and a half with the intention of doing some kind of art therapy or some kind of teaching of art, because I feel like art is a more free area in school than music is. I feel like music is too mathematic for me. Music school's so hard. It's math.
I lost my faith in God when I lost my daughter to Cancer, the beast. I begged, I cried, I offered my life for hers, and day by day, I watched that beautiful little Angel slip off. So, excuse me for not taking my seat next to you on Sunday in Church, I feel too cheated to worship.
So remember, if you're feeling bitter - or sorry for yourself about what you've done, and how much good you've accomplished - or if you find yourself more than anyone else talking about the good you've done, you're doing it for the wrong reasons, because it should be the default.
Nowadays, especially when you think of electronic music, it's like, the producer is mostly the one who makes the music or the beats and everything. But I am more, since I'm that old, when I started to make music the producer was just sitting in the back shouting and drinking beer.
If I was a cabinetmaker or a commercial fisherman, it would be the same question - how to connect to my world. The job we do affords us the opportunity to have people listen to what we say. But a lot of people have a similar situation: They're trying to find a way to do some good.
I think it really changes things when you're able to get married. I mean, the Marriage Equality Act was super important. I think you cannot believe it happened as fast as it did. For a lot of gay people, it's very surprising. You thought that this is going to be a struggle forever.
This is what I do to keep my head screwed on semi-straight and keep my heart open. Whenever I sing, that's why I sing. Whether it's at the Grammys, whether it's in the bathroom, whether it's in front of 10,000 people or three people, by my guru's grace, my head stays in that place.
I actually own works of art I've always wanted to own - I collect photographs by the late William Claxton. I met him in L.A.; later, he agreed to shoot the cover for my album 'Call Me Irresponsible' for free. I was so fat at the time, and he made me look as good as I possibly could.
You can't tell young people what to do. You can't tell 'em because they'll look at you and say, 'Well, how can you tell me not to do that when you were there doing it yourself?' Or supposedly were doing it yourself. I think you must let everyone live their life the way they have to.
At some private events, we'll see the CEO of the company get up and do his 'Rock Lobster' dance. The band used to grumble that, 'All they talk about is hair and don't take us seriously,' but I've realized that what this band does the best is let loose and let people's freak flag fly.
Worship is so much more than the songs I sing. Instead, worship is in the heart that lifts the song. If you think about it, worship began when I woke up this morning. My life purpose is to give God glory through everything I do. If my life does not worship Him, my songs don't either.
The fullness of Your grace is here with me The richness of Your beauty’s all I see The brightness of Your glory has arrived In Your presence God, I’m completely satisfied For You I sing I dance Rejoice in this divine romance Lift my heart and my hands To show my love, to show my love
Ruth Montgomery had a book I was reading called Aliens Among Us. She was an automatic writer. She used to go into a trance, and she would just start typing information, and then she would come out of her trance and read it and go, "Wow," and that was just the way she wrote her books.
The artist that had the biggest impact on me was Michael Jackson. He was my Elvis and Beatles. When I was 15, I listened to a lot of Sinatra, but my jean jacket didnt have, I love Frank on it, it had, I love AC/DC, Guns N Roses, Pearl Jam. I thought Eddie Vedder was the second coming.
I was pretty shocked [having concert in the Madison Square Garden]. It could have gone either way. But I think it's the right time. Nobody does what we do with taking the visuals and making it a complete rock 'n' roll show with the really good songs. Nobody's done that in a long time.
I had a somewhat religious upbringing. Not strict, but it was there, and I'm kind of thankful for that. If you grow up just watching MTV, that's its own form of religion, and it's not even based on happiness or communal responsibility. I mean, try to construct a worldview out of that.
Nine times out of 10 when people do a tribute album or tribute songs for somebody, it's what I call 'white boys playing reggae'. They know they can't, we know they can't, so they sing like they can't and play like they can't. They gently make fun of the idiom or sing in a false accent.
Whenever I'm really stuck, when I really need to go 'in there,' I sing the Chalisa and that connects me to Maharajji, to Hanuman, to that powerful presence that's deeper than any of that stuff. And, by touching that, I'm able to overcome whatever I'm stuck in...at least for 10 minutes.
In Zen Buddhism, "The Great Cessation" is a term that points to the abandoning of the effort to define one's self by any outer definition and to give up acts of futility. It is to let the world remain a mystery that cannot be captured by science, language, or any invention of the mind.
I love that I'm able to take people away just for a little while. Even if they come to my show and it's an escape from taxes or heartbreak or a shitty workplace experience - all those human beings I get to sing for laugh and emote with give me more happiness than I could ever give them.
Once I had the band, Jason [Moran] and John [Patitucci] and Eric [Harland] - it's very exciting to have that trio of just world-class guys - I already knew it was going to be fantastic. I didn't really tell them anything about it. They didn't know what they were going to play beforehand.
My visions and fantasies are pretty standard. The only difference is I got to do it, while most of us haven't. Beyond that, I'm a pretty standard guy. Give me a gal with a sense of humor, acidic wit, who's read a few books and has a body like a Swedish speed skater, and I'm quite content.
We don't have universal health care. Education is so expensive. We have these massive problems, you know? So it makes me really happy to think that somebody could have all the music in the world for free. But at the same time, if you have enough money to pay for it, you should pay for it.
I think war is just part of human nature. And I’m fascinated by human nature – especially the dark side. I always have been. It doesn’t make me a Devil worshipper, no more than being interested in Hitler makes me a Nazi. I mean, if I’m a Nazi, how come I married a woman who’s half Jewish?
I've had my fill of "One Way To Rock" or "I Can't Drive 55." Those are guy songs to me, and I'm cool with that. But when you write a great love song and you start seeing that 50 percent of your audience is beautiful women, that's much more rewarding, than having a bunch of guys out there.
If guilt tells us that we've done something wrong, then shame tells us that we are something wrong. So many people feel isolated, not good enough, defined by the labels they wear rather than the identity they have in Christ. The love of Christ tells us that we're accepted; that we belong.
It took a lot of water to down just that f-king bat's head, let me tell you. It's still stuck in my f-king throat, after all these years. People all over the world say, 'You're the guy who kills creatures? You still do it? You do it every night?' It happened f-king once, for Christ's sake.
I basically taught myself how to sing and play by copying records, and that's just how it was for me. I know that's true for a lot of budding musicians out there - that's the thing that gets them inspired, is trying to learn their favorite songs. I think it's a great way to teach yourself.
I had no idea how much music and singing really means to people, and in my own tiny way to be a part of that is very humbling and very sweet, and and I feel very honored. ... I have a great appreciation for this, in every ways and a new understanding, and I'm just as amazed as anyone else.
In front of the camera and in front of the lens, there's no lawsuits, there's no agent, and there's most frequently no time limits... There's a longevity that's kind of built into it. I spend most of my time behind the scenes, and when it is time to perform, I'm genuinely delighted to do it.