Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
When I was 20, 21 years old, I had just got married. Put yourself in my wife's shoes. All of these fans all across the world would have Donny Osmond burning - record-burning parties. They would put my albums and burn them.
The "Highway 61" album [of Bob Dylan] was produced by Bob Johnston if I'm not incorrect. And Bob Johnston was an entirely different producer than Tom Wilson. Tom Wilson had produced jazz records and was a Harvard educated.
When I made '1983,' there were a bunch of tracks that were in the early drafts that didn't make it because they just sounded like tracks for rappers, and that's not really the sound I look for when I produce my own albums.
We were lucky in the days of Led Zeppelin. Each album was different. We didn't have to continue a formula or produce a certain number of singles. Because, in those days, radio was still playing albums. That was really good.
On the other hand, I'm very tolerant as well. I expect that everybody can play what they want. I'm only not tolerant when it comes to myself and what is presented on my album that I have to listen to for the rest of my life.
Yeah. It's all in the music first. The music is like women to me. It's like how you pick your music: everybody got their own different way how they pick their women and their music, and I guess that's what the album becomes.
The media has a lot of power, and everything I do is what I want people to see, whether it's putting out a new single, dropping a new album, doing a new movie or new collab with a designer - this is what I want people to see.
Steven, my friend who came out to me my senior year, was a huge Madonna fan. So I may know all the words to 'Bedtime Stories,' 'Erotica,' and a few more of her albums - and we may have watched 'Truth or Dare' a thousand times.
If I'd just been interested in record sales, I would have taken one of the deals I was offered after 'Soapstar Superstar,' made a quick covers album and probably had some success for five minutes. I decided that wasn't for me.
The great music for so many artists - the Beatles, the Rolling Stones - was always at the moment when they were closest to pop. It would be easy for U2 to go off and have a concept album, but I want us to stay in the pop fray.
I'm definitely obsessed about artists and the type of music and the playing and the tone and all that kind of thing - I'm not obsessed about what the best Beatles album is. I just think if The Beatles are great, they're great.
Each album comes from definitely a different period in the evolution of each of us individually as creators and the role that we take in life. The external stimuli changed... so the songs are full of lots of different meanings.
A lot of my favourite songs have Eno involved, but I love the work he does on the first two Roxy Music albums. He's creating atmospheres as opposed to composition, and it's a beautiful mixture with everything else in that band.
I did LSD and peyote in the late Sixties, before I got into cocaine. That was concurrent with my change from a straight comic to the album and counterculture period, and those drugs served their purpose. They helped open me up.
When I make music, I try to make something that is super colorful and something you've never heard before, so when you hear the whole album, it's a good feeling. Musically that's what I aspire to do whenever I'm making an album.
Superman told me... that we needed to make a double... type of record... and so I answered: 'Okay, Superman. We will make... a double type of record but it won't be a double album because... Batman... didn't want a double album'
The only criticism heard with any frequency of Elton John's first American album, 'Elton John,' was that the production was too grandiose. The melodies were superb, and lyrics frequently very good, and the performances flawless.
I have pictures of my daughter, in the hospital, at three seconds, six seconds, nine seconds, and then fifteen seconds, 'cause dumbass couldn't get the camera ready fast enough. Yeah, ha ha ha. She wrote that in the photo album.
Yo La Tengo were a major inspiration for me because they're one of the first bands that I got into on my own, separate from my parents, when I was in high school. I have all their albums. That's the place we'd like be in someday.
This way, if I did the album myself, and I produced it myself with my own label, it was going to be done the way I wanted to do it. If people like it or don't like it, it doesn't matter; I got something that means something to me.
In the music industry, it's pretty easy to make an album just because you want to keep going, like, 'This is the formula.' But the formula is your life. You have to live your life and you have to live it well - that's the formula.
I finished 'Beautiful Creature,' and I felt somewhat unfulfilled. I felt like this other side of me needed to be released. Some of the songs I left off the album weren't intense enough to be what I wanted. They weren't hard enough.
Every night I fell asleep to a different Beatles album. So I'm very familiar with the Beatles; Ringo was my favorite Beatle until I grew up and then changed. I made the switch over to George Harrison just in time to regain my cool.
I took a lot time to do the first album, and I was really happy about that album. I co-wrote the songs and it was a learning process. When I was working on that album I realized, for the first time, that I could write my own songs.
By the next one [albom],Occupation: Foole, I was right back into the trip again. I'm more frantic, more breathless. You can hear how sick I am. If you want to see a cokehead, just look at the pictures on the Occupation: Foole album.
I think that iTunes is opened up a whole new world to me, and I never thought it would. If you've got a day off in a hotel room, you can buy three albums and then they're there. It's kind of strange to have a relationship with that.
Sometimes I practice to Allan Holdsworth or John McLaughlin, but I don't just practice to jazz and jazz-fusion albums. I'll practice to TV theme music - one of my favorites is 'M*A*S*H.' I'll just play along with anything on the TV.
I don't know if people know this about me, but I'm into Billy Joel. I'm a huge fan of his and always have been. He's just a quintessential songwriter of our time. Talk about a storied career - so many classic songs and great albums.
All my money comes from show money. You might get your deals, your advancements to do your album, but it wasn't in great abundance. Everybody's money in the '90s came from doing shows. That's a whole lot of show money, and that's it.
I could come home, and I would spend the rest of the night just lying on the floor or the sofa listening to albums. It was like a movie to me. I still do, really, and doing the radio show ensures that I'll be sitting there listening.
People think because I've got some success, I've made it, but in my eyes it's like, 'How long has Jay Z been in the business? How many albums has he got?' Not that I'm trying to be Jay Z, but I am trying to be around for a long time.
The Germany I was enthused with was more old fashioned and kind of romantic. I just got there, and the next thing you know, I had this huge gilded album. It was kind of an amazing experience because I didn't intend it to be that way.
To get 300 songs to fit together on an album, it's not like I choose 300 songs and say these are the ones I wanted to pick. To get those 300 songs I sampled 1000's of songs and narrowed down the ones I felt worked the best musically.
If you're fortunate to get a first album that sells 10 million you have nowhere to go but down. I'm just going to be honest and your measuring stick is so high that haters are licking their chops because you can't do nothing but fail.
I think from an artist standpoint, you have to put out music that you feel like represents you and things you feel like your crowd wants to hear. And if that drives them to go and download the album or the single, that's what we want.
If you're going to reach for it, reach all the way for it. Albums like 'Purple Rain' and 'Thriller' and those kind of records, you had to reach far above the din of cynicism and modern living to get to that place, against all the odds.
I wanted to make something that reminded people of the way albums used to feel. I wanted something as good as the stuff put out by the Bomb Squad, or Dr. Dre and his production crew, or 'A Tribe Called Quest.' I miss albums like those.
I was wanting to do an album but I didn't know if I was really ready. Jerry Wexler was one of my closest friends and allies, like my godfather. He said, "Let's do an album." I couldn't sing worth a damn, but there were some good songs.
When I was younger, I listened to the greats: Winters, Mel and Carl, Nichols and May, Pryor, Carlin, Klein, Berman and lots of Lenny Bruce albums. But once I started doing fairly well, I didn't want to hear anybody's jokes or premises.
You're always frustrated, you don't have the chance to do a song on the album, like the Beatles did with Ringo and George, or like Led Zeppelin, where everybody was given a chance to contribute. There never is a chance with the Stones.
About six months ago, I listened to Siamese Dream. That was the first time I'd ever really heard my own album, because I had separated from the experience of making the record. And it really moved me. It made me cry, it's so beautiful.
As far as long-term goals, one of my favorite artists ever is Tegan and Sara, because every single one of their albums sounds different. Or Beck. I want to be like that because I come from so many different types of musical backgrounds.
Hopefully it will be possible to get all our other albums in American shops one day so if people are interested they can hear it but I'm hoping that people are going to be interested in what we are going to do, not just what we've done.
Everyone was saying, "Oh, Chumbawamba, they're crap, can't get arrested." But we had absolute faith in what we were doing, so we put our heads down and made the best album we possibly could. Then we got a deal based on the final product.
What was great about the 80s was that you still had record companies who would get behind developing you as an artist. You had these bonkers heads of department and A&R people who, even after a flop album, would let you make another one.
I recently discovered Artkive, a wonderful app that allows you to archive your child's artwork and create cool gifts like photo albums, mugs, mousepads, etc. It's very easy to use, and since Arabella is such a talented artist, I'm a pro!
I remember the first time I received a cassette tape of a band called The Clash. I became an instant fan of the Clash and then bought their albums after that and went to their concerts and gave them my money... but I first got it for free.
Yoko Ono is someone who's music I've discovered more recently. The current cd rereleases of her albums all had bonus tracks recorded just with a tape recorder and I'm really into these at the moment because they have a great intimate feel.
To create an album of love, I really had - I thought it was going to be easy, because I've always written love songs. But I thought if I really want to make a love album that contributes, that actually means something, I've got to go deep.
Prince, Bootsy Collins, Earth Wind & Fire and Parliament all had albums that sound different. I wanted to show, as a hip-hop producer, I'm one of those that can do anything, because I was raised on so much music aside from rap and hip-hop.