We’ve sourced some of the most interesting and thought-provoking Song Quotes from Gza, J-Hope, Quintilian, Vince Neil, Brian Wilson. Each of the following quotes is overflowing with creativity, and knowledge.
I probably take about a month to write a song, depending on how much time I can dedicate to it, and it depends on how many hours a day there are and how many days in a week and weeks in a month.
I felt that group vocals for ‘Airplane’ coming from all the BTS members who’ve been together through this journey would create an even more heartfelt song.
Men, even when alone, lighten their labors by song, however rude it may be.
With technology now, you can go in and sing a song, and for $100,000, you will sound flawless.
You know what? I’m not always in a positive, happy place. But I’m able to concentrate enough to come up with a really good song.
The song, ‘Life is Better,’ is about hip-hop. It’s about my love for hip-hop. And, you know, I go through all the artists from the beginning to the end, you know. And, well, not to the end, but since the beginning to now, you know.
If you hear a good song, it makes you hopeful like, ‘That is out there.’
‘Pretty Lady’ is the conversation piece where you just need to compliment your lady. If you are in a club setting, and you just been eyeing a beautiful woman, this song came from me trying to compliment women and them turning their face up at me.
It does feel really good when you play a new song, and it’s the loudest singalong of the night. It means just as much when we’re playing the old songs, and people are singing along to those, too.
To own your song is very special. Now that I have a platform and so many people watching me, I have an upper hand.
At art school, a teacher said: ‘The best paintings are when you get lost in a piece of work and start painting in a stream of consciousness.’ I wanted to do music, not art, so started writing lyrics that way. The first song I wrote was called ‘Ice Cream and Wafers.’ The next was ‘Holding Back the Years.’
I’ve always loved the song ‘It Might as Well Be Spring’.
I have perfected the art of the mean song to make me feel like I have a backbone.
When I met Michael Jordan on a basketball court at an athletic club – we hooped together in Chicago – he came to me and asked me if I wanted to do a song for his upcoming movie. I was like, ‘Yeah!’ I didn’t even ask what it was.
When I get up there, maybe I’m nervous for the first song, but then I get into it. It’s a lot of fun to stand up there. I always enjoy the moment when I’m actually standing on stage. When I’m done, I’m like, ‘Oh, I want to play one more song.’
I listen to Helmet – and I love Helmet, they’re a great band – but every song sounds the same.
When I was four, I wrote a song about falling into a black hole.
I got really hooked on this riff in the middle of this song called ‘Minor Miracles’ by my friend Eric Johnson from Fruit Bats. I got the tracks for that from him, and that turned into ‘Here in Spirit.’
I’m not a folk or jazz singer, more a hard-edged pop singer – with some rock, and song hooks.
With ‘Start With Me,’ I sent it to Gunna and he sent it right back. I didn’t have to ask him. If I send you a song, you gonna vibe to it and if you don’t, it’s cool.
Don’t just listen to my songs; listen to any song which you feel would make a change in your life.
In 7th grade, I believe, I wrote my first rap song. It was about everything I was seeing, everything that was going on around me.
Three chords and the truth – that’s what a country song is.
If I want to do song and dance, I will and I would like to but I don’t want to do it in every film. Where is the novelty then? It just takes the fun out of work for me.
The earth has grown old with its burden of care, but at Christmas it always is young, the heart of the jewel burns lustrous and fair, and its soul full of music breaks the air, when the song of angels is sung.
I think a good guitar solo sounds so much better within the context of a good song.
There’s no separation between electronic music and acoustic music. It’s all one thing. Each song has its own heartbeat. Each song has its own soul.
It’s never easy to write a song. It’s the most difficult thing I do.
Every bad situation is a blues song waiting to happen.
The thing is, my life is a country song. I don’t need to be manufactured, and I don’t need anyone to tell me what to say or what to sing.
Seven-11 is the pulse-beat of America. I think that Bruce Springsteen should do a song about a 7-11 in Asbury Park, New Jersey, but write it in such a way that American’s youth can identify and slurp along with the Boss. Hail the Boss! Hail 7-11!
That’s what I find with any good song, you just have to let it happen. Out of about twenty songs you might write, one of any significance. It might be thirty or forty, but I just keep churning them out and churning them out in hope that one of them will stick.
We never thought ‘Say Something’ would be a holiday song. I’m still surprised that it’s resonating at this time of year. Maybe that’s why it’s working so well – it balances out all the joy.
Young women should be telling stories of other young women. And if the superstar who is an amazing storyteller isn’t a writer, that’s totally fine, but we should get a young female writer in the room to work on that song with us.
‘A Pirate Looks at 40,’ we had to do that song. I’ve been covering that forever.
A good song is a good song whatever your age.
The coolest part about ‘God Made Girls’ is you had all these different women writing it, so you had all these different perspectives in this song.
I’m not afraid of being thought of as someone who is associated with film music. Why not? If it’s a good song, what does it matter?
Dance music cannot compete with a really great rock n’ roll song. There ain’t no DJ that’s gonna play something that can take ‘Mr Brightside’ or ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger.’
Recording a song for a film doesn’t take much time; it’s hardly an hour’s job, but concerts are constant, and so is travelling, so I’ve to take time out to work on my albums because I’m passionate about creating my own music. When you love something dearly, you set your priorities accordingly.
I sang ‘Your Song’ by Elton John, and Silva Screen Records were watching. They got in touch with my agent then had the idea of the Christmas album.
I remember when I would write a song as a kid, I would also write out on paper what the drums would do, what the bass would do, and what the vocals would be doing.
‘Allegiance’ is pretty much a book musical. You know, people talk and then they burst out into song.
I won’t squander my credibility, whatever that is, just for one silly song.
Legislation won’t necessarily start a riot. But the right song can make someone pick up a chair.
Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet.
For me, writing a song, I sit down and the process doesn’t really involve me thinking about the demographic of people I’m trying to hit or who I want to be able to relate to the song or what genre of music it falls under.
It was a kind of siren song that called me out to the front lines.
My muse is my wife. It’s not some vague thing that flutters around the astrosphere or wherever it is. Sometimes as a songwriter you need something to hang a song on, to give it some kind of presence and form. For me, Susie is that.
My favorite song that I wrote is ‘Love Line.’ This was my first song that I wrote lyrics for, and I really wanted to express the feeling when you’re in love and hoping the other person feels the same way.
Timbaland’s so wishy-washy sometimes – he’ll hate a song at first and then love it, and then maybe go back to not liking it as much as something else.
It’s so interesting how you can take a bad situation and make a great song out of it that somebody else can listen to and have a completely different perspective of the song and have their own meaning. That’s what’s great about it.
You may not hear much bluegrass on the surface of my music, but I feel the emotion I put in a song comes from bluegrass. Bluegrass taught me to interpret a song, not just sing it.
Never hate a song that’s sold a half million copies.
My goal is to get my music out to as many people as possible. That a song of mine is being played on the radio so far away from home really, really pushes me. It’s everything I’ve dreamed of.
A song is a burden that you carry happily.
Me is what them call illegitimate, that mean say me is a criminal, bomba rassclaat! That’s why me go write a song called ‘Illegitimate Children.’ It took me years to find out I was one.
When we was making a song called ‘Bring Da Ruckus,’ we took the snare, and we put it in an elevator shaft and recorded it.
You know that genie where you get three wishes? One that has never changed for me is I would like to sing, and move an audience through song.
If there’s a track that’s rhyme friendly, the verse will basically write itself. If the track is less rhyme friendly, you have to put forth a little more effort to get the song out.
Song Sung Blue took a lot of compressing and refining, and it has one of my favorite lyrics.
Since I have been singing for so many years, I don’t always need to approach a song quite so laboriously and meticulously.
‘Before I Ever Met You’ was the first one to come out and that just dives into the grit, and it’s pretty graphic about a relationship. For my first song, it was very special the way it happened, because I didn’t really hold anything back, and people responded to it.
The ‘Billionaire’ song is what my kids tease me with. They sing it to me. It’s funny.
‘Junglee’ was a magical journey. When you see the visuals of the film or the song ‘Fakeera,’ it reminds you of Dehradun.
A close-up on screen can say all a song can.
‘Something Good’ is a feel-good song. A reminder that you’re dope and have something wonderful to offer life and yourself and the world.
I think it shows when you have to work too hard on a song.
Today, I’d like to talk to Bob Marley. I’d just like to ask him what was his method. Bob is one of the greatest songwriters ever. I don’t know if people understand how powerful his songs are and the simplicity and genius behind them, from ‘Redemption Song’ to ‘Is This Love?’ and ‘I Shot the Sheriff.’
I don’t ever have the pressure of making a hit, because I’ve never had a hit song, per se. The closest thing to a hit song was ‘Shiraz,’ and it’s not your prototypical hit song, with a catchy hook and all this other stuff.
We shot ‘Telusa Telusa’ song in Bolivia. It took us 50 hours to get to the location. We shot in high altitudes, and oxygen cylinders were kept handy.
When I did ‘1,2,3,4’ on ‘Sesame Street’ they’d rewritten the song and made it about counting. At first, I balked. I was like, ‘Counting to four? That’s where we’re going with this?’ Then they sent me appearances by other people like James Blunt doing ‘You’re Beautiful’ as ‘My Triangle.’
For every benefit conferred, God is to be praised in his gifts. Otherwise when the time of judgment comes, that man will be punished as an ingrate who cannot say to God: ‘Your statutes were my song in the land of exile.’
Salman Khan gave me a break, and that proved to be a boon. By the grace of God, my first song was a blockbuster.
As I’ve gone along, I felt like I was discovering an aspect of my voice that I didn’t know was there: an ability to interpret a song in a way that makes it more accessible.
I have a song called ‘Young Voorhees,’ because I like to call myself the new Jason Voorhees, and it samples ‘Courage the Cowardly Dog.’
When it comes to song creation, I throw in my ideas and have it discussed with the producer. The song gets its own characteristic as new ideas are incorporated.
Whether I am performing for an elite crowd or a crowd of 20,000 people – the moment someone asks for ‘Agneepath,’ and I respond ‘Agneepath’ chahiye?’ the noise in the crowd, shows that this song has become huge.
When the Beatles wrote ‘Paperback Writer,’ it couldn’t have been the same old thing. You can hear so many influences in it, from the blues to Bach, and it’s not just verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge chorus. They start off singing a cappella, almost like a Bach chorale, and the song goes into this bluesy guitar riff.
I can’t tell you how many things I’ve worked on where I sat on it for a few years, and then somebody else did something very similar. Whether it’s some weird vocal effect you hear on another record, or a drum beat, or even a song title, a subject matter, or a mixture of different kinds of music.
Item song dancers like Silk Smitha and Jayamalini have become irrelevant. The heroines are doing those dances themselves.
Each song has its own way that it likes to be done, but it can be more than one way. If you tap into it, you can feel it.
The Blues are the true facts of life expressed in words and song, inspiration, feeling, and understanding.
Well, as a songwriter, it’s really dangerous to use the word love in a song. It’s a word that has been used in songs so many millions of times before, and it’s the most popular topic to ever write about.
I tend to write on an acoustic guitar or the piano. I have kind of a rule: if I can’t sit down and play this and get the song over, I don’t take it to the band, because most any good song, you can sit down and deliver it with a piano or a guitar.
‘Faucet Failure’ was my favorite because I just had fun with it, and it was just 10 minutes, and I didn’t overthink anything, and I wanted to just have fun with the song.
When scoring music, the idea is to ensure that your song makes it to the playlist on your audiences’ music player and stands out from the multitude of songs released every day.
I’ve always had a fascination with pirates. You know, I’ve written a song completely inspired by I want this to feel like pirates, you know, fighting together, made a music video about it, yada, yada.
The purpose of my songwriting is to put the things I have been through in a song in order to help others who may be in a similar situation.
To me, it’s all about the song. Songs are what make me excited. You hear a great song and you want to record it or get a great idea and you want to write it.
I guess the point of that song ‘Troublemaker, Doppelganger’ is trying to navigate the worth of beauty and if it’s hurtful or helpful to value beauty. If it’s a curse or a blessing. Is that something really negative and morbid, like the hearse, or is it the limousine – a glamorous symbol of enjoying life?
I did a song with Rihanna recently, and I was like, ‘How did you find out about me or whatever?’ And she said, ‘Drake.’
When a song blows your mind the first time you hear it, you don’t know where it’s going. It’s blowing your mind as it’s unfolding. Then there’s that sensation that you’re actually going to remember the song.
I always say my role in Metallica is to support the song and to support my team, and whatever that means, I’m there for it.
I spent ninety percent of my money on wine, women and song and just wasted the other ten percent.
Sometimes in the middle of the night, I wake up with a song in my head, and I have to finish it so I can fall back asleep.
Even if I don’t release it myself, somebody else might hear it and want to record it. When you write a song, it gives it that potential.
We proved to the world that a completely Spanish song can take over the world.
Toil without song is like a weary journey without an end.
‘Mama I’m Coming Home’ is one song that I think is incredible. One of his best songs ever written. Lemmy wrote the lyrics to that.
In a way song writing can almost be detrimental, because suddenly you find an outlet that is a kind of cheating. You don’t need to have direct communication. You can say, ‘I can’t describe it to you, but I will record it and send it to you.’
I didn’t know how to play guitar until I was 21, but from the moment I was good enough on guitar to even put one song together, I kind of billed myself as an artist.
I got a song called ‘All That I Got Is You.’ I wrote that from the heart.
A great song can make a terrible singer sound good, but a good singer – you put a great song on top of that, you’re really in great shape!
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.
To me, there is nothing more soothing than the song of a mosquito that can’t get through the mesh to bite you.
Sometimes the worst thing that can happen is, ‘Oh, I’m on stage playing a song,’ because you’re daydreaming about something else, you’re on autopilot. You have to fight that.
Flawed Design’ is a song on the record and it explores why people feel a need to present themselves maybe not necessarily as what they actually are. It seems like in society, a lot of people want to be or try to be perfect.
I think I’m alright as a lyricist, you know? But then what will happen every couple of months or so is that I’ll hear a song I’ve never heard before and feel I’ve gone right back to square one.
When I wrote the song, I had the sea near Bombay in mind. We stayed at a hotel by the sea, and the fishermen come up at five in the morning and they were all chanting. And we went on the beach and we got chased by a mad dog – big as a donkey.
My aunt, Rosie Gaines, sung with Prince – ‘Diamonds and Pearls.’ And at the time, I didn’t realize how big of a song that was. I just thought, ‘Oh, that’s my auntie singing with Prince. That’s cool.’
The first album I ever bought with my own money was ‘Ten.’ Every single song reminds me of my childhood.
I wouldn’t go so far as to make ‘You Don’t Own Me’ a tango or ‘It’s My Party’ a hip-hop thing. Believe me, those things have been suggested to me. But I thought if I could stay true to the song, the arrangements would work. I’m really enjoying singing them.
‘Wrecking Ball’ is a great song.
Music is a language in itself and the songs have their own soul, every song has its soul.
The Siren waits thee, singing song for song.
I haven’t made anything I don’t believe in. I’ve always started a movie with a song in my heart, and even when I’m a little unclear about it, something magical happens and it comes into focus in a way that I’m feeling good about.
My mom is a very religious woman. So when I began recording music, I was afraid she wouldn’t accept it. But when I played her a song, she loved it.
I’m 18 in this album. I’m not losing fans, and I’m not disrepecting women, but you reach the maturity of taking it to the next level with a girl. It was only necessary for me to have at least one song like that.
Usually I start with a beat, I start making a beat, and my producer side is making the beat. And on a good day, my rapper side will jump in and start the writing process – maybe come up with a hook or start a verse. Sometimes it just happens like that. A song like ‘Lights Please’ happens like that.
I feel like music can affect you in so many ways. When you hear a song with a happy melody, it can change your mood; it can change your day.
I don’t like my music. I’ll make a song, and if I do like it, I’ll feel it, but after that 10th play, I don’t like it no more.
I’m from the disco era where everybody thought they were John Travolta… What song is going to get me on the dance floor? Anything from ‘Saturday Night Fever,’ and you’re up there like a demon.
I always loved that old song ‘Banks of the Ohio’ – it was always such a man’s song, so I’ve always wanted to record it.
What can I say? I’m just a relevant dude. It’s just natural. My hunger’s still there. I still keep my ear to the streets. I record every song like it’s my last. I just love music. I’m blessed.
My dad took me for an audition once, to show me, ‘OK, you want to be a child actor, this is what it’s like.’ I sang a folk song about donkeys on this West End stage with this big director, and there was a queue of 200 girls all singing ‘Memory.’ I was terrible. Terrible.
When I sit down to write a song, it’s a kind of improvisation, but I formalize it a bit to get it into the studio, and when I step up to a microphone, I have a vague idea of what I’m about to do.
You’ve got to be a really straight man to write a song like ‘It’s Raining Men.’
Music is a diary. Sometimes people make music as if no one’s going to hear it, as if they can just be completely honest. Things are a lot more acceptable said in a song than it would be in person. Art excuses a lot of things.
Oh my God, if you’re talking terrible theme songs, you have to mention Matt Hardy. I can’t understand what they’re even saying. There’s a point in Matt Hardy’s song where it sounds like they say ‘I want to meet the cheese.’ I’m always like, ‘Meet the cheese?’ Just goofy stuff.
Somehow you can tell the difference when a song is written just to get on the radio and when what someone does is their whole life. That comes through in Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Willie Nelson. There is no separating their life from their music.
I don’t think there’s any danger of me playing Indian music. However, I did a song of George Harrison’s ‘Beware of Darkness’ that was kind of like that. That was an illusion. I was playing that on a thumbtack piano, and Jim Gordon was playing tablas. He’s an amazing player. That was as close to India as I ever got.
Singing was probably my first love, and song writing. I write a lot of love songs and heartbreaking songs.
‘My Swan Song’ – that song is so depressing but uplifting at the same time, you know what I mean?
In terms of the production, the style I use is what I see as the ‘Lisa Stansfield sound’ and I would hope that when anyone puts on one of my songs they don’t even have to listen to my voice to know this is a Lisa Stansfield song, because of the way it sounds.
In karaoke, you don’t choose the song; the song chooses you.
There’s just a natural human element to a great song that feels immediately satisfying. I like the song to create a mood.
Ab-Souls Outro’ serves as a jazzy, spoken summation of ‘Section.80’s themes. Guest cohort Ab-Soul opens the song with one urgent verse after another: Flowing freely like the saxophone behind him, his words advocate veering outside life’s most predictable pathways.
I want to play music when I want, write a song if I want or watch a baseball game if I want.
When you listen to a song, it should make you sit up and wonder, ‘Hey, what is this!’ or give you an inexplicable feeling of joy or relate beautifully to the music in you.
I hate being manipulated by song. Don’t tell me what I should be feeling. I don’t want cellos or violins to be telling me that I should be bawling right now.
The reason I play music is to touch people – for selfish reasons, as well. It feels good to make someone else feel something, whether it’s a kiss, a painting, good idea or it’s a song.
If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.
The last name is pronounced Jill-en-hall. It’s spelled with two l’s, two a’s. We have a song in my family; G-Y-Double L – EN – HAAL spells Gyllenhaal. It’s a Swedish name. It’s a family heirloom set to music.
I would like to work with my ideal type, Song Hye Kyo sunbae. Although she has an elegant and classic style, her charisma is also strong, and her acting talent is outstanding. If we act together, I think I could learn a lot from her. But I’d probably be nervous a lot of times.
The issue I had with the Lightspeed albums was that usually the main purpose with them was to fulfil really dorky musical goals, like, ‘I wonder if I can do that,’ and it was all very personal. It was more that once I’d finished the goal of what the song was, I was kind of done. It was like ticking boxes.
Once you have an established song, you can really come out of your shell and experiment with the sound you want to make.
Walk on a rainbow trail; walk on a trail of song, and all about you will be beauty. There is a way out of every dark mist, over a rainbow trail.
Much responsibility rests upon the shoulders of the song leader; it is not infrequently within his power to make or break a meeting.
I wrote ‘She’s a Lady’ on the back of a TWA menu, flying back from London after doing Tom Jones’s TV show. Jones’s manager wanted me to write him a song. If I have an idea and I don’t have a pad of paper, I’ll write on whatever is available. What’s the difference? Paper is paper.
Sometimes ideas are coming so fast that I have to stop doing one song to get another. But I don’t forget the first one. If it works, it will always be there. It’s like the truth: it will find you and lift you up. And if it ain’t right, it will dissolve like sand on the beach.
Maybe I’m a dreamer, but I think the ordinary guy has just as much right to say ‘This is a good song’ as somebody who is in the music business.
Producers like to record all the drums first, then they do the bass, then all the guitars, so you’re constantly moving from one song to another.
Not every song of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s was a single, but songs like ‘Tuesday’s Gone’ and ‘The Ballad of Curtis Loew’ and ‘Made in the Shade,’ ‘I Need You,’ people learned those songs from the radio because radio played albums, not just singles.
I wrote my first song at 12 and remember someone asking, ‘What were you going through at 12 that you could write about?’ I get what you’re saying, but 11, 12, 13 were the hardest years of my life. You learn everything. You learn how horrible things feel.
‘Halo’ I wrote with my grandpa in his nursing home. When I went to visit him, he’d often comment on my halo. But of course, I couldn’t see. And he always – he had pictures of Jesus with these beautiful halos. And so I asked him if he’d write a song with me about Jesus’ halo.
There’s a song called ‘My Faith’ that’s kind of my spiritual song on my record. It’s a little bit of my softer side of me, comin’ out of left field a little bit.
I try to tell a story musically in a song.
Bottom line: Black men like curves. When they’re crooning to women about how beautiful they are in an R&B song, the ladies you see in the video don’t reflect what those guys like.
‘Storm’ was the first song I did as a member of YG. The record gave me a lot of pressure. I didn’t think I was prepared at the time.
My first gigs were at university: I’d dress up as Jesus, jump off a cross and dance to a Mick Jagger song. I don’t know if it was funny or not, but it was a start.
I came into the music world in 1988 with a song called ‘Ooh La La,’ that was like a breath of fresh air in Haitian music.
Silence is more musical than any song.
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.
A bell’s not a bell ’til you ring it, A song’s not a song ’til you sing it, Love in your heart wasn’t put there to stay, Love isn’t love ’til you give it away!
Nashville, there’s people that are ten times more talented than me, ten times better singer than me, song writer than me, but for some reason you get the ball, and now – and now you run with it. And you do the best you can.
I was about to walk on stage at the Kansas Speedway – I was playing a NASCAR race – and I said to Scooter Carusoe, who was standing side stage, ‘I want to write a song called ‘Wanna Be That Song.’ Then I put my earphones back in and walked right out on stage.
‘Mean’ is a song I wrote about somebody who wrote things that were so mean so many times that it would ruin my day. Then it would ruin the next day. And it would level me so many times, I just felt like I was being hit in the face every time this person would take to their computer.
I do disagree with the way videos of my songs have been made. ‘Afreen Afreen’ is a very powerful song; it did not require such a video. The emphasis should be on the song. Again, I have told my recording company, and in the future, they will screen the video only after my approval.
Most of my songs are about Jesus. Most of my songs are about the idea that there is salvation, and that there is a Savior. But I won’t mention his name in a song just to get a cheap play.
I always tell up-and-coming DJs you have to really love what you do and find that interest to drive you. It requires so much attention to detail, and it takes up a lot of your time. You hear a song, and there are so many little pieces that make that song work. It requires a lot of patience, diligence and resilience.
My daughter is 15. None of her friends know who the hell Chris Rea is, but they know that song – as soon as it comes on, they start singing it. I’ve played with everyone from Status Quo to Talk Talk, but nothing impresses them as much as the fact that I play on ‘Driving Home for Christmas.’
If I did an item song, it would be something to watch out for.
‘Peace Train’ is a song I wrote, the message of which continues to breeze thunderously through the hearts of millions. There is a powerful need for people to feel that gust of hope rise up again.
No matter where you are or what you’re doing, it’s always great if you don’t have to get up and physically change the song that plays next.
A true friend is someone who is always there during the ups and downs, I actually have a song called ‘True Friend’.
Madonna can still produce a catchy pop song, but she hasn’t expanded her artistic vocabulary since the 1990s. Her concerts are glitzy extravaganzas of special effects overkill. She leaves little space in them for emotional depth or unscripted rapport with the audience.
‘Buena Vista Social Club’ is a great song and a difficult tune to play.
When I create a song, I immediately think about what I’m going to wear when I perform that song. I think about the music video treatment and about how I’m going to look on stage when I perform the record. The connection is so obvious that it’s a single package. An outfit, to me, is almost a tool to express the music.
I came down to Orange because I sold the Smothers Brothers a song called ‘Chocolate,’ and that gave me enough money to move down here. I was washing windows down in Orange County when they called me up and said they wanted me to do their TV show.
I was telling people like ‘My Dawg’ gon’ be the song that get me out there. I knew it.
I’m all for a good slow song and I love all different kinds of music.
I had a really great performance with Steven Tyler in the movie ‘Be Cool.’ I performed ‘Cryin’,’ so we recorded the song beforehand. But I didn’t get to meet him until I hit the stage with him, and we had a live performance with 30,000 people in the audience, and that was for the movie.
I actually admire the Indian artiste ‘Lost Stories.’ He made a remix of my song ‘Faded.’ That is really good and cool because it actually represented Indian music. I just loved the song; it so unique.
In Mali, you hear music everywhere. What is fantastic in Mali is the music tradition is handed down from father to son orally. It is not written. You learn from your father and add something, because you are living now and telling a story to others. This results in many different interpretations of the same song.
Music is a powerful tool in galvanizing people around an issue. There’s no better way to get your point across than to put it in a beautiful song.
‘My Name Is’ by Eminem was a song that changed my life.
IU and I hosted a music program together, and she had told me that she would be writing a song for me. My fans call me ‘Peach,’ so when her new song came out, I called to ask her about it, and she confirmed that the song was for me.
When you’re making music, it’s meant to be shared with people. Sometimes, even if I’m writing a song, someone else brings a vibe. There’s something different about it. If someone can play a better bassline than me, I’ll let them do it. I’m just here to fit in and see where it goes.
I liked the way they treated the first, second, and third place finishers equally. It was an amazing year. I only entered two song contests this year; I won one and placed second in the other. And I entered each of them a day or two before the deadline.
I can write a song in about an hour if it’s a simple country song.
I’m not blowing my own trumpet here, but I made a rap song 20 years ago with Afrika Bambaataa.
I feel like the theme song to ‘Duck Tales.’ ‘Life is like a hurricane; it’s a duck blur.’ That’s absolutely what it is.
A song in a musical works best when a character has to sing – when words won’t do the trick anymore. The same idea applies to a long speech in a play or a movie or on television. You want to force the character out of a conversational pattern.
I’ve said before: ‘If you’re going to earnestly sing a song around a campfire, you’d better be a Muppet!’ Or else we’re just not going to buy it.
The first song I wrote was called ‘Here I Go Falling In Love’ I wrote it in the sixth grade.
You’re a song written by the hands of God.
When you find a song that you love, you just have to do it – why would I try to match it? When I wrote more of the songs in the ’90s – ‘Nick of Time’ and other songs I was surprised I came up with – it was because nobody else was saying what I wanted to say.
I never really got paid for ‘Tell It Like Is,’ but I look back at it and say God knew what he was doing; he probably figured that if I had got money back in them days, I wouldn’t be here now. That’s okay. I’m here. And I’m still singing the song.
If I would make a song dedicated to any woman, it would have to be my mom because, you know, she’s been there since I came out of her. She would have to be the one… my mom or my daughter.
To me, a song is new every time I sing it.
It’s likely that taboo words are stored in the right hemisphere of the brain. Massive left hemisphere strokes or the entire surgical removal of the left hemisphere can leave people with no articulate speech other than the ability to swear, spout cliches and song lyrics.
If Paul McCartney tells me that so-and-so song is his favorite song, what do I care? What do I care what anybody else says?
I think what people are attracted to about me, if anything, is my passion. People got exposed to my passion through music and song first.
New York sounds like something that I could really listen to. It’s like a vibe; it’s a hit song. It’s a song that you could listen to in five years and still like.
The song ‘Gave It All Away’ has a reggae sound.
If my life had to be a song I would name it, ‘Live every day like its your best day ever’, because it pretty much is.
Finding fresh song topics can sometimes be quite difficult.
A lot can be said with just a look, or the way the body moves. Each song is a different character. So each song takes on a different movement of the body. And the body has to go with the subject and the attitude that you have toward that subject.
‘She’s a Mystery to Me’ was released in 1987, when I was 11 or something, and I absolutely adored the song. This song was written by Bono and The Edge, and the story goes that Bono woke up with the tune in his head, then thought that the only voice who could sing this song is Roy Orbison.
I don’t really have a favorite genre. I could listen to a rock song, a metal song, jazz, pop music, whatever. For me, whatever style it is, it always depends on the chord progression, the lyrics, and the melody used.
My favorite thing to do as a kid was pretend I was in the opening credits of a sitcom. As the theme song would play, I’d look up at the imaginary camera and smile as my name would flash on the screen.
All I know is, I play the guitar, beat it out, and sing a song that has some damn resonance that we feel as musicians. We send it out and people get it, and that’s a good thing.
I always knew ‘My Dawg’ would be a hit, but I didn’t even know what a hit was. When I made the song I knew it sounded hard.
A lot of times, somebody will say something and it will give you a good title. So you carry a pencil with you and jot that down. You don’t just write a song right quick, though. You fool around and work with it. You have to keep going over and over it and see if you can’t write a song that means something.
I wanted to make ‘Mexicana Hermosa.’ It’s a love song, but it isn’t. It’s more like a song as if Mexico was the Maria, the beautiful woman that I love.
‘Free Fallin’ is a very good song. Maybe it would be one of my favorites if it hadn’t become this huge anthem. But I’m grateful that people like it.
In karaoke, you don’t choose the song; the song chooses you.
When the audience resonates with my music and sings every single word from the song, the high of performing live is unmatched.
I’ve never written a political song. Songs can’t save the world. I’ve gone through all that.
History repeats itself, but the special call of an art which has passed away is never reproduced. It is as utterly gone out of the world as the song of a destroyed wild bird.
There’s nothing worse than being stuck with a bad song.
It’s always important for me to say something with my music, even if the deeper message is hidden inside of what sounds like a fun, upbeat song.
In the Stephen Sondheim song, when something bad happens in the circus, they send in the clowns. In America’s political circus, they send in the lawyers.
‘If You Could Read My Mind’ is a different experience every time I sing it. It’s just that kind of a song.
Once at the White House I was asked to conduct the Drum and Bugle Corp. The man just handed me the baton and I finished the song. It was great. I got to keep the baton.
A DJ can’t just play one song. It’s about playing a set, or how you connect songs in those two hours, and where you place them.
My daughter, who is 7 years old – I have no idea where she learned this – she made a video where she’s beat-boxing. We have no idea where the beat-boxing came from, but all of a sudden, there it was. Now we’re launched into lyric sheets for every single song that is current. They’re all over our house.
Sisters are brittle things. God was penurious with me, which makes me shrewd with Him. One is a dainty sum! One bird, one cage, one flight; one song in those far woods, as yet suspected by faith only!
It is a very serious consideration for a lyricist to step in there and suggest the meaning to a song. The music is speaking for itself.
‘Kiss Me.’ That’s my ‘Twilight’ tune, a song you’d have on the ‘Twilight’ soundtrack.
It should take you 15 minutes to make a song, and then get out of there.
Honeymoons are great, but they don’t last. And I think the same is true with success on the screen – today, I am all over the place; tomorrow, I may be gone – I may have to make room for someone else. So why make a big song and dance about it all?
There’s a song called ‘Live Blogging the Himmel Family Bris.’ I kind of went for it here in terms of – it was really fun to be explaining ritual circumcision in Nashville – a lot of brises are done in hospitals, but many are done in people’s homes, and there’s a lot of food, and a lot of leftovers.
I didn’t choose a word or anything. I just wrote the song until it stopped.
The autumn wind is a pirate. Blustering in from sea with a rollicking song he sweeps along swaggering boisterously. His face is weather beaten, he wears a hooded sash with a silver hat about his head… The autumn wind is a Raider, pillaging just for fun.
The great thing about a song is that no one has to know your story. But if you tell it in a way that has clarity and means something to somebody else, then it can apply to their story.
But the one thing I’ll always know is that people don’t know what they want until they get it. They didn’t know they wanted a song about taking a horse to the old town road in 2019. But they did.
At the beginning of a new project, often before I do any actual writing, I collect photos, quotes, song lyrics, and even objects that relate to the characters or the world I’m creating.
As an independent artist, there can be nothing better than the fact that your song will be played and heard in different corners of the world.
The emotions in a song – the anger, aggression – have got to be legitimate.
Gunna ain’t never wrote no song for me. He just showed me how to rap.
I’m not sure it’s a better music world of appreciation and performance. I think the listener is a different guy, and listening is something he does in passing, with other stuff going on. There’s less care and understanding of the relationship between the song and the listener.
I don’t have time to stand around and listen to an 11-minute song.
When you write a hit song, and you know it when it’s done, it’s one of the best feelings in the world.
When you hear me, you know it’s me, regardless of the song.
God knows why – no pun intended – but every time I write a song, I feel a need to touch on religion.
It’s hard enough to sit at a table and talk to most people as it is. But we can go to some town, and there’s 300 people we’ve never met before, and by the third song, we’re connecting with everyone in that room.
Every song that is a Hopsin song, I 100 percent made it. Nobody helped me. There was no producer to say, ‘Hey, put the beat like this… ‘ It was all me. If the song was wack, then the song was wack. If it’s dope, it is what it is.
I’m a musichead. My favorite Gaga song of all time is ‘You & I’ – it might not be the popular vote in terms of charts or sales, but it’s my favorite.
Writing a song is much like being an author. Yes, we all have tools to write (everyone has a brain I hope!), but that doesn’t all of a sudden make us best selling authors.
‘Better Than Home,’ the song, is about getting out of your hiding place and having the courage to live as loud as possible. It is about feeling the life that has been given and has been waiting for you all along.
Even when I was calling myself the Microphones I only really ever played new songs… because I feel, like, a pretty strong connection to the song when I’m performing it.
With me having this raspy voice, people always asked when I was going to sing on a song. When I was going at it with 50, people were saying I don’t sing on my own hooks. That always stuck in my head and people always told me I had to use my own voice not just to rap.
I love the song ‘Into the Night.’ It’s Roy Orbison meets David Lynch meets Iggy Pop on amphetamines. It has a punk edge that is not HIM, per se. It is super melodic and super ’60s, and that is very new to me and it is a sense of achievement to me.
Once a song’s out there, it’s no longer mine. And that’s the whole purpose of music: to belong to people.
When Billie Holiday sings a song, I hear the song, but I always hear her and her truth.
I usually work on a film soundtrack for two years, turning in a song every few months, and that keeps my creative energy high, because I’m constantly rotating projects. The trick is to make sure I don’t work too hard and get exhausted.
Song Joong-ki is known for his sincerity and manners. He is younger than me, but I thought I learned many things from him.
Gunna was the second person I ever made a song with.
It’s not so uncommon for me to get so wrapped up in a song that I cry several times when I sing them. That’s the difference between my music and some of the other folks.
Usually, one of us will bring a song to the group that they think we could arrange and perform well. If the group agrees, we arrange it. It doesn’t always work out though. We’ve tried to arrange a few songs that just we ended up canning in the end.
In The Go-Go’s, my philosophy is that I contribute whatever the song requires. I never think, ‘What can I put in here to show off the latest trick that I just picked up?’ What I think is, ‘What’s required from me as a drummer to make this a better song?’
I’m always excited to see the reaction of the crowd when I’m playing a new song.
When I write a tune – and it’s been like this for many years – I always hear in the back of my head some sort of vague, orchestrated, fully fleshed-out big-band version of the song with other parts going on.
There was this song I was working on called ‘Swing.’ It was almost finished, but there was something missing, and I couldn’t for the life of me figure it out. And then this little piece of information – this little tweet – came to the forefront of my mind.
We’ve gone further on this album, where we have a Big Band song, kind of a Sinatra-type song; we have a couple songs that have electronic music on them. We’ve got a couple rock songs, maybe a little heavier than what we’ve done. So the title ‘Jekyll & Hyde’ really covers the breadth of the record.
When you hear people scream because they’re about to hear a song that has been a part of their life, there’s nothing like that.
‘Fool If You Think It’s Over’ is still the only song I’ve ever not played guitar on, but it just so happened to be my first single, and it just so happened to be a massive hit. It was in the U.S. Top 10 for seven weeks.
Making a record? You’ve got to have the song, then you create a record. I think it’s the same with a live performance. If the material is strong, you’re already 90% there. I always tell young people it’s all about the music, the songs. Work on the songs, work on the songs, work on the songs.
Joni Mitchell’s someone who has tried to make sense of her own world, sometimes painfully, through song.
You never know what little idea or joke, what flame flickering really quickly, will become a song. That first idea, it can come any time. If it’s in Spanish, you go on in Spanish. If it’s in French, French. If it’s in English, English. Or Portuguese. I’ll try to do my best. I like Italian, though I don’t speak it much.
You don’t really know a song until you play it live.
If I hear one more tailgate in the moonlight, Daisy Dukes song, I wanna throw up.
Anytime an artist puts your name in a song, it’s unbelievable. It never gets old.
I always like a good song: puts me in a good mood.
I feel like no matter what I write about, I try to end up being the stronger person in the situation. Even in heartbreak, I feel like I’m a much stronger person because of that. I don’t want to just write a sad song and still feel sad after that. I want to feel stronger and better.
It was a fabulous time, doing ‘Hear My Song.’
If you write a hit song for Britney Spears, it’s worth several million dollars. Just one song! And it might have taken you two hours to do it. It’s like mining for gold. It takes a lot of skill and a lot of technique.
I grew up in a time when the only musicals were animated musicals because nobody wanted to see people to break into song.
I wrote ‘(‘Til) I Kissed You’ about a girl I met in Australia. Her name was Lilian, and she was very, very inspirational. I was married, but… I wrote the song about her on the way back home.
‘Hell Or High Water’ was written after the end of a relationship, and I do feel like every Passenger album has the obligatory break-up song.
We’ve been able to have our cake and eat it, too. Every song, every T-shirt, is absolutely a pure expression of what we want to do. And it connects.
It is a part of us, film-makers and audiences; what we can’t say with dialogues, we say with a song. We tell stories through songs, look at our folk cultures.
I used to listen to that song, ‘I just wanna be successful!’ I was like, ‘I’ma be where bruh at.’ I used to watch him on ‘Degrassi.’
Every record we do, we do one song we didn’t write.
I think my all time favourite song would be between ‘Slow Dancing in a Burning Room’ and ‘Dreaming with a Broken Heart’ by John Mayer.
Thus we have at least a national song that unites all Germans, and is the symbol of our sixty-million nation.
I am passionate about singing, and I strive to improve with every song and keep getting better.
You have to have that organizational principle behind the song.
‘Planet Caravan’ by Black Sabbath is such a delicate song from such a surprising place.
Whenever I work with different artists, I expand as a song writer, as a producer, and I always want to try and find the bridge between my world and their world.
The challenge for a good musician is to bring out compositions that seem fresh to the listener, even if the listener has heard the song or the composition before.
I had a song back in 1992 talking about ‘It’s all good.’ Then my partner Theo who used to work for 92.3 The Beat in L.A. started saying ‘You know it’s all good’ on the radio and everybody took it back to their soils like that was the new Cali word. But that’s a regular word form the Bay Area.
With songs I almost see the images, see the action, and then all I have to do is describe it. It’s almost like watching a scene from a film, and that’s what I go about trying to catch in a song.
The song that starts with ‘Neene Rama, neene Shama, neene Allah, neene Yesu,’ is very profound. It exhorts people to stop looking for god everywhere and to instead look within themselves.
You can cage the singer but not the song.
I never have any problem getting enthusiastic with a good song and a good band.
I wouldn’t have a No. 1 record or song if I wasn’t a hardworking person.
When you’re a writer, your song has to resonate with the person you’re writing for in order for them to want to sing it. But if you’re an artist, you can sing whatever you want.
Songwriting is a mysterious art. When I sit down to write a song, the end result should be mysterious and have this dark quality.
If you can’t play it on an acoustic guitar or a grand piano then it’s not a song.
Wonderful Christmas Time’ is a Christmas song but it was supposed to be an attempt at a traditional song.
I really believe it’s not bad to look back within music. I don’t mean retro, but using your own memories to make a song because our memories are what make us who we are.
I was the first Indian music composer to win the China Gold Award for ‘Jimmy Jimmy’ from ‘Disco Dancer.’ Adam Sandler repeated the song in his film ‘Zohan.’ ‘Disco Dancer’ is historical, as are ‘Sharaabi’ and ‘Namak Halal.’
I wrote ‘Love Foolish,’ and when I heard the music for the first time, it felt like this was a song that Twice hadn’t done before. I thought the song and music had a very mature tone, so I wrote the lyrics to match. I was inspired by the music directly.
Sending greeting cards to aliens is hardly a new idea. In 2005, Craigslist solicited messages for broadcast to space by a transmitter in Florida, and in 2008, NASA beamed a Beatles song to the North Star (Polaris), on the assumption that any putative Polarians would appreciate the Fab Four’s 1960s-genre compositions.
Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song.
There were no rules, other than that the song should sound good and be fun to play.
To feel not only submitted but willing to be anything or nothing as the Lord wills it – this is, in truth, to sing a song to our Well Beloved.
There’s actually a song called ‘Vegas Lights,’ which I wanted to be an anthem for Vegas, that represented how I felt when I went to the clubs. I felt this weird energy where everybody was having a good time, and it didn’t matter. Dancing like nobody’s watching. It was kind of beautiful.
My story is a freedom song from within my soul. It is a guide to discovery, a vision of how even the worst pain and heartaches can be channeled into human monuments, impenetrable and everlasting.
The song of the blues, the song of the music, was something a lot of people missed out on. They thought they had to swagger a certain way or bark at the mic, and you don’t have to do that.
It was my 16th birthday – my mom and dad gave me my Goya classical guitar that day. I sat down, wrote this song, and I just knew that that was the only thing I could ever really do – write songs and sing them to people.
I get on my porch with my guitar, look at my trees, and write a song.
I was essentially trained by Oscar Hammerstein to think of songs as one-act plays, to move a song from point A to point B dramatically.
Being from Philadelphia, ‘Parents Just Don’t Understand’ was a big deal – I have audio of my brother and me singing that song.
We’re not playing your typical guitar tuning, so there is no normal chords for us to get our footing with. We’re pretty much making it up as we go as far as the sounds we’re creating. Oftentimes, the song will be inspired by just a certain kind of block of sound that somebody creates.
They really can’t imagine what my voice is like. Every time I sing a song, they are very surprised.
The actual writing of a song usually comes in the form of a realisation. I can’t contrive a song.
Even if it’s a song I know isn’t gonna do that well, I’m dropping it as a piece of art, so I always want sick visuals to go with it.
I wanna be able to stand on the stage and hold out the mic and people sing all the lyrics to my song.
I think anything that’s creative really takes my mind off whatever it is that I’m going through in my life. If you’re going through heartbreak, and you can write a song, it’s a wonderful win-win, because it takes your mind off the heartbreak, and you get to vent.
I got to choreograph a halftime dance with the cheerleading squad, which was all-female, at my high school. And I was the only boy, at the time. We did this whole routine to ‘Maria Maria’ by Santana, and ‘Thong Song’ by Sisqo – it was a mix.
Came from a song that I made from, like, 2012 – there was some phrase like ‘Rap Monster’, and I just, I thought it was so cool. But as I grow up, and as I came to America, I think it felt like too much. So I just abbreviated it to ‘RM’, and it could symbolize many things. It could have more spectrums to it.
I think when you sign a recording deal, you think, ‘I’m going to put out a song and have a hit right away. I’ll be a giant superstar. I can take over the world now.’ But I put out a song, and it did OK. It wasn’t like leaps and bounds.
It was that famous joke: What’s the last thing the drummer said before he got kicked out of the band? ‘Hey, I wrote a song.’
To know how to suggest is the great art of teaching. To attain it we must be able to guess what will interest; we must learn to read the childish soul as we might a piece of music. Then, by simply changing the key, we keep up the attraction and vary the song.
It’s very hard to teach someone how to write a song if to begin with there’s no creative crop to harvest.
I just try to get inside the song and imagine what comes next.
There’s nothing like a good cheating song to make me want to run home to be with my wife.
I need a little bass and I don’t even need that crazy bass to break your face. I just want it to sound good when I have my favorite song.
Portishead’s production is just insane beats you would expect to be on a KRS-One album. But then there’s this little white girl with an angel voice singing over it. It was a cool juxtaposition. I like ‘It’s A Fire.’ That’s a chill song with kind of a military drum thing going on, like a drummer boy.
Piracy was kind of hard: It took a few minutes to download a song. It was kind of cumbersome. You had to worry about viruses. It’s not like people want to be pirates. They just want a great experience.
As a musician and a guitar player, I can noodle as well as anybody. But from my background as a session musician, I always try to play what is called for by the lyric and listening to the song. As a writer, that’s what I do, too.
‘Float On’ was a fine song, but I was still writing the lyrics on the last day we were working on it and deciding if it was something we wanted to put on the record.
Last tour my bass rig was breaking down every other night. That was a pain. We would get on stage and Trey would count off the song, and I’d play the first note and nothing would be there. Those guys would just roll their eyes.
To this day I get mail from women who say, I went to law school because of your song. But I would hate to think out of the wide spectrum of things I have done in my career, that’s all I would be remembered for.
One day a whole damn song fell into place in my head.
When I met Michael Jordan on a basketball court at an athletic club – we hooped together in Chicago – he came to me and asked me if I wanted to do a song for his upcoming movie. I was like, ‘Yeah!’ I didn’t even ask what it was.
I love pop music. It’s not easy to write a good pop song.
A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life, I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth – that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire.
Justin Hayward was a teenager when he was drafted into the Moody Blues in 1966. He brought with him one song he had written for his girlfriend. This was called ‘Nights in White Satin,’ which subsequently made a fortune for a lot of people.
Even though other people wrote my songs I put my stamp on them. I have a connection, but there is no truer connection than an artists and their own song.
I remember the first time I heard ‘The Thunder Rolls.’ It was dark, and we were driving to the beach. There was the thunder outside and the thunder in the song. It was eerie.
‘,Alive’ stems from emotional growth and contentment. Before writing the song, I was swimming in a pool of hurt, guilt and spiritual discomfort. Instead of drowning, I decided to embrace these feelings and express gratitude for the lessons learned. With this new-found sense of life, I am stronger and happier than ever.
Music’s staying power is a function of how timeless the lyrics, song and production are.
In my off-time, I do record. Once in a while, I’ll just go into the studio if there’s a really good song that I have in my head and want to do. I think, as artists, you’re constantly in creative motion. If I stopped writing songs, then that’s a part of me that would stop in my life, and I need constant motion.
I try to look at most of my solos as a musical piece within the song, not, say, showing off.
I don’t have a family that grew up singing and playing all the time. I didn’t really have anything to judge my abilities against until I got out into the professional world and met other professional musicians. All I had was my own way of arriving at a song. That was it.
‘If I Can Dream’ is my all-time favorite Elvis song. It was a big record, but not as big as it could have been. It was one of those records where you’d think it sold 10 billion copies, but it didn’t.
There are times pop music is the end result when I’m in the studio, but I don’t really go in and say, ‘Today I am going to make a pop song,’ but it can happen.
Singing is a way of releasing an emotion that you sometimes can’t portray when you’re acting. And music moves your soul, so music is the source of the most intense emotions you can feel. When you hear a song and you’re acting it’s incredible. But when you’re singing a song and you’re acting it’s even more incredible.
The day Guy Clark passed away was the day we wrote ‘Girl Goin’ Nowhere.’ It was the first day I had met Jeremy Bussey, who I wrote the song with.
Every time I hear that Champions League song, it reminds me of hearing it for the first time in the old Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam.
I was just in the middle of singing a song about how broke we were and now my cell phone rings.
I don’t think any artist really knows why a song gets popular.
There aren’t reasons why you like this song or this piece of music, or don’t like it. It’s just, it’s either right or wrong, you know?
You have to learn how to act a pop song. You have to find the balance of the pop from the pop song and the lyrical significance of the scene you are in.
Black people lived right by the railroad tracks, and the train would shake their houses at night. I would hear it as a boy, and I thought: I’m gonna make a song that sounds like that.
I was lucky enough to grow up in an era when radio was less formatted. It was really special. You could hear a jazz song then a pop song then a show tune then some jazz. Basically, whatever the DJ felt like playing, he would play. He was educating you and exposing you to things you would never hear otherwise.
Inspiration is enough to give expression to the tone in singing, especially when the song is without words.
I write a lot, and very often I write a couple of lines that are particularly revealing in some kind of way. And then as a few more lines get added and a piece gets added, eventually the song pretty much takes over and you can’t really find a way to change those things.
The song ‘Baby Baby,’ I so love that song because I wrote it about my first daughter.
When you do a song new live on stage, it’s kind of a bit weird until it gets worn in, you know, like oiled up a bit. It’s still a little bit stiff until you really thrashed at it for a few weeks.
One of my biggest thrills for me still is sitting down with a guitar or a piano and just out of nowhere trying to make a song happen.
Every day we should hear at least one little song, read one good poem, see one exquisite picture, and, if possible, speak a few sensible words.
I must have listened to at least 10 covers of Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’ – Jeff Buckley’s cover is usually my go-to song.
The longer one is alone, the easier it is to hear the song of the earth.
‘Mi Gente’ is a song that embodies a special moment in music – a new sound of a Latino culture on the rise and being embraced globally.
‘Check Yes Or No’ is a song that I reference in ”90s Country.’ George Strait had a very crafty lyric: it tells a story then comes back around. Never gets old.
The fundamental human truth underpinning ‘Ox Mountain Death Song’ is that men so very often turn into their fathers. The way that everything gets passed down.
‘Do What You Gotta Do’ is a positive, inspirational song that says no matter what it is; whether you’re up against challenges or trying to get your dreams and aspirations met, you should do what whatever you have to do shy of killing yourself or someone else.
The first mp3 I downloaded, which I guess was illegal, was a symphonic rendering of the Super Mario Brothers 1-1 theme song. It was great. I was like, ‘This is blowing MIDI files out of the water. This is the future, right here.’
After talking to people and meeting them every day, I realize that a song can be written from one perspective with an objective in mind. What is crazy about it is that many different people can take one song a totally different way. That is so cool, since music is a universal thing and a very personal thing.
I’m the kind of person who needs to feel like everything happens for a reason. When you date a guy and it goes badly, that’s horrible. But if you can write a song about it, then it was worth it.
It was just the next logical step from making succinct pop songs. What do you do after that? You make pop songs that are longer and more epic, that push the envelope. Imagine your favourite song, or something that you play over and over in the car, except that you don’t have to start it over as much.
If in the twilight of memory we should meet once more, we shall speak again together and you shall sing to me a deeper song.
‘Tim Timtya’ was different from what I usually do. I had to develop a texture to go with the song. In fact, many told me I sounded like Shreya Goshal, which came as a pleasant surprise. Transitioning from tracks like ‘Sunny Sunny’ to this one was quite different.
My favorite song is Whitney Houston’s ‘I Will Always Love You’ because my brother used to sing it to me as loud as he could. Annoying then, favorite memory now.
The soprano has all those other instruments in it. It’s got the soprano song voice, flute, violin, clarinet, and tenor elements and can even approach the baritone in intensity.
If I write when I’m low, it will be a dark song, but I don’t care. I want to be honest with myself at all times.
I’ve been fascinated by the Internet from the very start. In 2001, I had made a funny black-and-white film called ‘How to Dance Properly,’ a short video of me dancing to a Madonna song. I sent it to 17 of my friends on a Thursday, and by Monday, one million people a day were logging on to view it.
If we were to put out a song in English, we would have to put in lots and lots of effort.
I don’t think you could pull one Bob Marley song that didn’t have quotes from the Torah or the Old Testament.
You could have written the biggest hit song, and all eyes are looking to you to write another one. It’s not a thankless job; it’s just an endless job.
Art, a book, a painting, a song, can definitely inspire change, whether it’s a small change or a big change but you know there’s novels I’ve read or a scene in a film that I’ve seen where I definitely inspired something and made a change or addressed an issue in my life or done something cliche like make a phone call.
I was 18, at art school, and saw this cute boy playing banjo. I was obsessed. I taught myself how to play. I listened to a lot of country and just messed around. The second song I wrote on the banjo was ‘Good to Be a Man.’ That what’s got me signed.
‘Despacito’ was a song that, from the time I started writing it, I felt that its hook was really catchy and powerful but at the same time very simple.
I’m definitely not going to go and sing a song that condones certain things.
I don’t ask for the meaning of the song of a bird or the rising of the sun on a misty morning. There they are, and they are beautiful.
When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song, and die like a hero going home.
Music isn’t like news, where it’s what happened five minutes ago or even 10 seconds ago that matters. With music, a song from the 1960s could be as relevant to someone today as the latest Ke$ha song.
A song has a life of its own. It’s an autonomous thing, separate from your own experience, almost. And the mere repetition of it means it’s subject to change; it means approaching it differently, expressing different emotional aspects of it. It doesn’t feel like wallowing.
‘Spring Day’ – I wrote main lyrics based on my personal experience with old friends. It is about my sad memories with him, and it makes me sentimental whenever I listen to the song.
Most of the songs I write are full of power, and I’m suspecting it may come from my love for grotesque Renaissance art and the Eurovision Song Contest.
I think most bands probably peak on their first album. We peaked on our third album. On the first album, I feel like I wish the production was a little better. I’ll always hear a song I don’t like. I look for what I could have done to make it better. It’s always difficult for me to listen.
I wrote that song for my wife, and it’s what some guy who’s sitting under a tree would be singing to the woman of his life, telling her how wonderful she is. To me, that’s more lasting than something that sounds like it belongs on a movie soundtrack.
My work is music. That’s why I could set to tune a song such as ‘Kathirunnu Kathirunnu.’
What I’ve learned how to do as I’ve gotten older is to take all of the information that I have, and push it aside, and try to distill each song into an emotional theme. The hardest thing that I’ve ever had to learn how to do in playing music is use the sound of my instrument to create an emotional effect.
‘It’s Everyday Bro’ started with me talking about the things I do on a day-to-day basis. From there, the creativity was unleashed, and the song was the result.
I think Bridge Over Troubled Water was a very good song. Artie sang it beautifully. The Boxer was a really nice record. But I don’t think I’ve written any great songs.
Everybody has their favorite sad songs. That’s part of what I love so much about country music. Country music is never afraid to go with a sad song.
In pop or rock you can make a fast song or a slow one, but in disco there is really just the one rhythm.
Gospel music to me has always been a balm for the soul. It has been able to usher in the spirit, usher in worship, true worship and praise, healing. I find the music to be very good at healing and the passion, you know, which is a testimony being told in song.
I have a younger brother and sister who actually play in my band, and we were always into Disney music, big time. The first time I heard myself sing was when I recorded myself singing a Disney song. I remember it because it was awful, and I didn’t expect to hear that. I think it was ‘A Whole New World’ from ‘Aladdin.’
Die Like a Rich Boy’ has, for me, some of the strongest lyrical content I’ve heard in many years; an epic love song laced with dark imagery and acerbic social criticism.
We human beings are tuned such that we crave great melody and great lyrics. And if somebody writes a great song, it’s timeless that we as humans are going to feel something for that and there’s going to be a real appreciation.
The funny thing is, people’s perceptions of what a song is about is usually wrong a majority of the time. But they’re still going to read what they want to into it.
There are moments in our lives that are more difficult than others. And I can look at each song and remember where I was during those times – from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows.
Music, at its essence, is what gives us memories. And the longer a song has existed in our lives, the more memories we have of it.
I’ve always been a fan of melody and emotional melancholy, whether it was Rites of Spring or Tears for Fears or Neil Young. If I hear a song that has a sweet melody, I’m a sucker for it, whether it’s Linkin Park or Little Richard.
I like books that aren’t just lovely but that have memories in themselves. Just like playing a song, picking up a book again that has memories can take you back to another place or another time.
I can plunk out enough chords to write a song, but I’m completely afraid to play guitar in front of other people. It’s a fear of failure, I guess.
I don’t sing in the shower, but my go to song to sing in the car: ‘Clouds to the left to me. Jokers to the right. Here I am.’ ‘Stuck in the Middle With You’ by Stealers Wheel.
The comedians all finished their acts with a song. They would get a certain amount of money from the song publishers and would use that money to pay the writers. None of them paid very much for their comedy material, but it all added up.
I guess I’m rather self-destructive, and I like to give other people who are self-destructive a song to sing.
There is a song called ‘I Refuse,’ and I get a bit scolding, I suppose, in a way. But it all comes back to elements of hope, and in the case of that song, it’s basically, ‘Okay, you’re trying to suck me into this world of negativity, and I’m not going to go there. I’m going to live my own life.’
All men that date me have to know that their name may end up in a pop song.
Sporadic thoughts will pop into my head and I’ll have to go write something down, and the next thing you know I’ve written a whole song in an hour.
There is no formula to it. Writing every song is a little journey. The first note has to lift you.
I’d rather get a hot dog or a doughnut than write a song.
That’s the miracle of music. No one can reinterpret a Picasso, but a song can be remixed and covered and interpreted in an infinite number of ways. It’s a living thing.
Da Pak was a group out of Chicago. It was a put-together group. We actually met for the first time at this showcase. They were like ‘Yo, you should do a song together.’ So we did. It just so happened that the name of the song was ‘Wolf Pak.’ They said, ‘Y’all should be a group called Da Pak, and here’s a record deal.’
With good music, yes, we can bring people together because a good song will touch your soul no matter what and where it is coming from.
I’m an auditory learner, and if you put something into a song, I’ll remember it forever.
I write songs about stuff that I can’t really get past personally – and then I write a song about it and I feel better.
I think that commercials can really ruin a song. You know that the person sold the song for a good deal of money, and that was the tradeoff. But, music and picture can marry in a beautiful way, and the reverse also.
Some people buy records just to dance to ’em. Some people buy records to listen to the radio. And there’s people that buy records ’cause they listen to every song.
I don’t know, samples are just like unlimited ideas, you know? Sometimes a lot of people sample one song. A lot of it is also really just up to the artist and their creativity to see where it goes and what they want to do.
I just have a thing in my brain that when I’m about to do something that’s genuine or authentic, I think of it in song form. I’ll be like, ‘Yo, this is a human emotion that no one talks about.’
To me, the lyrics of the song define the kind of style it is.
I just like a good, sad song. The sadder, the better. It moves me.
Unfortunately, ‘How You Remind Me’ is the song most perfectly suited to my voice.
I really get inspired by songs. Like, if I hear a thug ‘Want to kill ya’ song, I’m ready to go out and get crazy. Or if you hear this really sexual, sensual slow song, I want to go have sex. I’m very animalistic when it comes to stuff like that. Very basic emotions.
I was in a movie with Angelina Jolie called ‘Life Or Something Like It’ where I played her fiance, and I have a song in there.
Of course, if you’re gonna make a rap song, you’re gonna want to sound like Melle Mel.
I’ve woken up from dreams and the whole song is there. I’m listening to it in my dreams. I consciously have to wake myself up and get a tape recorder because I hear it like a record.
I always feel a rise in my scalp or in the backs of my wrists when something is special, whether it be a song or a man.
In every song I write, whether it’s a love song or a political song or a song about family, the one thing that I find is feeling lost and trying to find your way.
Whenever I’m writing a song, if I have an idea for the music video, that’s how I know it’s a good song.
I think a good song is a good song is a good song.
Then all of a sudden, Quentin Tarantino comes along and puts a song from 40 years ago in one of his films and they’ve suddenly discovered you. That was a real gift that Quentin gave me.
You know Nashville, there’s people that are ten times more talented than me, ten times better singer than me, song writer than me, but for some reason you get the ball and now – and now you run with it. And you do the best you can.
Me and Tory Lanez got good chemistry together. We could make a song so easy, but we always like to figure out what we’re really doing. We can make a good song, but it gotta make sense.
Alan Cumming was such a fun guy to watch. I remember he has a song in the first ‘Spy Kids’ movie, and when Danny Elfman came to set, they were working on the song.
Yeah, but on the U.S Tour we threw a new song into the set almost every night. Ofcourse, you can’t do too many new songs every night as they’ve never heard it.
I wrote ‘Truth Is’ with Julia Michaels during our first time working together. The song is about emotions we often think of but are afraid to voice – the feelings we try to convince ourselves we don’t actually feel.
I was telling people like ‘My Dawg’ gon’ be the song that get me out there. I knew it.
I think in order to accomplish anything in life, you have to visualize yourself there – accepting the award, hearing your song on the radio, whatever it is – or you lose the willpower and the drive.
Language’ is, I think, my favorite song that I’ve ever written.
‘Watchmen’ is like the music you feel is written just for you. ‘That’s my song, no one else gets that but me.’ That’s why the fan base is so rabid, because they feel personal about it.
Considering the amount of information we’re bombarded by, it’s amazing if a song can transcend time.
When I first went on the ‘Johnny Carson show’, the band did not want me, and Carson did not want me. If the audience had not received ‘Tiptoe’ so overwhelmingly, I do not believe Carson would have let me come over to be on the panel after the song.
I’ve always been jealous of rappers, because they can fit so many words into a song and tell a story with lots of details. But when you’re a songwriter, you have to fit the words to the melody and you can’t fit as much in. I’m just a big fan of storytelling.
