It's quite hard not to cringe at your own music; you're always a bit annoyed at some parts of it.

When they ask who is your biggest influence, I always say Pharrell: whether it is music or fashion, I'm a big fan.

Whenever I cook, I think of Spanish music, so I always have to listen to some sort of salsa. It gets your body going.

My teachers said, 'Always keep a Beethoven sonata under your fingers.' I always have. I still play chamber music, and I always play classical.

I've always listened to different styles of music to make sure I'm balanced. I feel like if you only listen to your type of music you can never go outside of it.

I've always had a fascination with making your own music but never have been skilled enough to play the instrument, so to be able to make music without the ability was awesome.

The thing I always found about the gospel music was that it reached further into your being if you like, your mind. It takes hold of you - especially if you sing it and play it.

I remember my grandmother used to always say, 'Don't put all your eggs in one basket.' But when I realized that music was inside of me, I decided I'm putting all my eggs in one basket.

It's always been my philosophy to keep a lot of balls in the air. With music, most things don't pan out, so you try to increase your odds by being involved with a million things at once.

I started writing out all of my feelings, and people asked me, 'Have you ever thought of recording your music?' It was something I'd always thought of, but I'd never really had the confidence.

I always take an iPod and iPod speakers so that when you're in the hotel room you can have it on, or when you're at the beach you can put it on quietly. Music can really set the tone for your holiday.

When you get new people around you, the excitement is new because they have different take on your music. They play it in a different way, and that's always exciting to be around. It elevates everybody onstage.

I think you are always influenced by your surroundings and where you grow up. Your environment is always one of the things that shape you, and the music scene in Iceland was a very important factor in shaping me.

Music changes every three months. There's always new artists coming out. There's always new sounds. There is always a new hit coming out. You gotta stay relevant as much as you can and feed your fans as much as you can.

For me, playwriting is and has always been like making a chair. Your concerns are balance, form, timing, lights, space, music. If you don't have these essentials, you might as well be writing a theoretical essay, not a play.

I always thought, if I wasn't racing, one of my dream jobs would be as a scout, going town to town and trying to find bands in all these little dive bars. That would be so much fun, discovering music that way as opposed to from your phone.

To me, it's always a joy to create music no matter what it takes to actually get there. The real evils are always whatever stops you from doing that - like if your CPU is spiking and you have to sit there and bounce all your MIDI to audio. Now that's annoying!

There's always those few people that are like, 'Why don't you play any of the material off your first two records?' And I'm like, 'For the same reason that I don't play with G.I. Joe dolls anymore.' It's like, 'I'm a grown-up.' I wrote that music when I was a kid.

I think the biggest way of connecting with people is through your music and kind of saying what you want to say as an artist. And hopefully, you're making something that someone's going to be like, 'This is my favorite song.' That's always your goal, I think, anybody in any genre.

My little brother is four years old and he listens to all my music. I don't know how he finds it, but he knows how to use an iPad and he's always online. So one day my mum said: 'You know what, you have to make something for your little brother,' and that's how I made 'Lean & Bop.'

When Phil and I started out, everyone hated rock n' roll. The record companies didn't like it at all - felt it was an unnecessary evil. And the press: interviewers were always older than us, and they let you know they didn't like your music, they were just doing the interview because it was their job.

I didn't have to apply my mind to the aspects of scales and playing, and instead, I focused on creativity. I wrote music, but I didn't 'practice' it. So yeah, you can always get better and improve your technique, but hopefully, that comes through being a musician and composing and being a creative individual.

Even when I'm not onstage singing, there's always music going on in my head. It's a curse and a blessing in a way - it's sitting in bed at night, trying to go to sleep, while the music keeps playing in your head - especially when you're trying to learn something new and you're trying to memorize it and get everything.

I know that there are going to be people that don't like my music, but I think in the industry itself it is always that, 'Oh. you're from the 'X Factor.' There have been certain radio stations that will not play your song because you are from the 'X Factor,' yet they'll play another song from an artist from another TV show.

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