Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Image is everything, and the voice or the idea or the song is hardly anything at all. Half the time the person isn't even doing the singing. I'm a bit cynical about this [music] business.
Find out what you really like if you can. Find out what is really important to you. Then sing your song. You will have something to sing about and your whole heart will be in the singing.
If you're writing anything decent, it's in you, it's your spirit coming out. If it's not an expression of how a person genuinely feels, then it's not a good song done with any conviction.
I have this lust for the so-called South Seas. I would like to explore every corner of the Pacific. You know the song: 'To everything turn, turn, turn, there is a season.' It's just time.
There was a moment when Prince did rock & roll with a sponge-y seductive sound. I think that's what was in our head for 'Get On Your Boots.' But actually, the song is much more punk rock.
That's one of the things that always grabbed me about rock music: There's a song, and you know how it goes, and you can sort of predict it, but a lot is left up to chance and interaction.
I'm pretty positive that if I started singing songs that were for my fame, the God would probably make me tone deaf again. I know why He gave me that voice. I know why He gave me my ears.
The schematics are a little bit tricky, but once you get it down you're able to really program an entire show. Every song has a lot of different guitar sounds in it, so that's what it is.
When "Search and Destroy" by the Stooges came on as a Nike shoe commercial, I got physically sick. That song meant the world to me, and I didn't feel this was the way it ought to be used.
Like a circle in a spiral Like a wheel within a wheel Never ending or beginning On an ever-spinning reel As the images unwind Like the circles that you find In the windmills of your mind.
I grew up going to a real small missionary baptist church. We would sing a lot of the old standards... the hymns and everything. Those songs are still my favorite and are pretty timeless.
You never forget where you were when you write a song; it's a very proper memory, so I knew exactly where I was and what I was doing for each track. It was like going into a time machine.
In the modern operas that 'Miss Saigon' and 'Les Miz' are, nobody breaks out into song from conventional book dialogue. Everything is sung from beginning to end, including the recitative.
So I think it was a good thing It was a little surreal watching Leo scream 'I'm not going to die today!' with our music playing - that was the last thing on my mind when I wrote the song.
And it’s a sad song, Todd, but it’s also a promise. I’ll never deceive you and I’ll never leave you and I promise you this so you can one day promise it to others and know that it’s true.
Sometimes I start with lyrics - rarely - but sometimes I might have an idea for some lyrics that I wanna say. I write them down and figure out how to use that in a melody to write a song.
Sketching is the breath of art: it is the most refreshing of all the more impulsive forms of creative self-expression and, as such, it should be as free, and happy, as a song in the bath.
I plan to write more songs of my own, especially on behalf of the animals we needlessly raise for food, at their great expense, and at great expense to our precious, deteriorating planet.
I've never really been a big fan of comedy songs, frankly. I think I enjoy the emotional payoff that the best music achieves to want to waste too much time turning good music into a joke.
It was just a mercy f**k, as it was our 30th anniversary. They gave Grammy to us for a cover of somebody else's song. It would have a lot more meaning if it had been for one of our songs.
You're lookin' so good in what's left of those blue jeans Drip of honey on the money maker gotta be The best buzz I'm ever gonna find Hey, I'm a little drunk on you And high on summertime
I remember when I was 14, I went to race in Hungary, and I went to a concert, and they were playing Bob Marley songs, and I thought, "Wow, this guy is so special." It's Marley every time.
Singing your own songs live is so personal, it's like standing there reading out your diary pages. I still get really nervous so I would have to say performing is the greater rush for me.
I think I was perceived in one fashion. A video is based on a song. I think you can get glimpses of people's presence within that. There's some people you enjoy watching more than others.
I love metal songs about metal. That's one of my favorite things. Nobody does that any more. Nobody sings about how metal they are, or about their fans, or about how crazy their pits are.
You don't have to come from Trinidad to really love Harry Belafonte, you don't have to come from the West Coast to appreciate the simplicity and the beauty of the songs Kurt Cobain wrote.
Every video you see in the movie we have an entire video of it that will be on the DVD, so the whole video for African Child, the whole video for Super Tight, you know the Jackie Q songs.
The first music you really fall in love with is more than just music. It's something that clicks in you beyond the song; it's a message or image that causes you to jump in and not let go.
In the meantime [1963-65], [Bob] Dylan was writing some of the best love songs in the genre, like "Girl From the North Country," "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright," and "It Ain't Me, Babe."
When you do have songs where you're going to say something, some kind of statement about cultural or social stuff, that in general people love it. People love to be challenged in that way.
I wanted to have all the songs to be the strongest they could be and all the choruses to be catchy. One of those records you could put in your car and just drive and not have to change it.
I did a couple songs with this hip-hop guy named Tim Dark. He was working in the same studio I've been working in, he heard my music and he said, aw man, I've got to do something with you.
If you have a song that you think sounds like another song you should contact the publishing company and say I have a song here, let's cut a deal that lets everyone walk away feeling good.
Its quite there sonically; a strong representation of what the songs on our records are like. It's very loud and our set is based around containing as much energy and dynamics as possible.
In earlier times, so many people sang much more. You know as a kid you'd go to some kind of religious training and or summer camp or whatever it was and you'd learn to sing a lot of songs.
When I play live, it's a conversation that we're all having with the song, and the audience... their response and relationship with the songs is as valid as my relationship with the songs.
But at this phase of my life, I want to write and not have to think about whether a song is going to be a hit. I want to explore the music that inspires me, and I don't want to ape myself.
I definitely still have ... angst but I also wrote some songs that say it's okay to love, now. I'm happy in my life, and it's a bit easier to write happy songs when you are actually happy.
People say, "How do you write songs?" I say, "Patience." I may have a track that's hot, but no words. I'll just let it sit for years, because I know they're going to meet. They'll find it.
I try not to be overly literal. When I'm writing songs, I write down a lot of words, and then I try to simplify it. I like to give people hints or words that make visual pictures for them.
I really love something about being around the recording studios - you know, like, those days in the '80s they'd be, like, in the studio 'til 4, 5, 6 in the morning working on these songs.
What is so important is that you play for the artist and for the record and for the song ... everything else falls into place ... my solo has to be a complement to the singer and the song.
I don't make the mistake of thinking it's a major musical event. I love the Eurovision Song Contest and it will continue long after I'm gone. Just please don't ask me to take it seriously.
When you're writing a song with someone, it's a very personal process. The music has to be an organic experience, it can't be contrived, sometimes it is and I think people pick up on that.
I wanted to play rock and roll when I started playing. Nobody at that time ever thought about songwriting. You sang songs, that's all. You sang other people's songs. That's all there were.
So we're considering doing a new Christmas album, because there's been Christmas episodes since then, and maybe finally do the version of 'The Most Offensive Song Ever' with lyrics intact.
All the big loud housey songs came from the idea of 'I want to create the same song over and over again.' Except that I've created each one in a different location, or a different mindset.
I think one of the biggest things that's changed in terms of the rapport with the crowd is that now crowds come to hear our songs. We're getting closer and closer to an artist performance.
People are always going to have favorite albums or songs and you know that's more the listener's personal bias than basing it on anything musical or actual. I'm the same way as a listener.
I started being me about the songs, not writing objectively, but subjectively. I think it was Dylan who helped me realize that - not by any discussion or anything, but by hearing his work.