Etta James Quotes
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To me, country music is like the blues, but it's something very hip and - I don't want to say commercial - but it's very worldly and good listening.
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It's not about battling the original artists when I record these songs, it's about paying tribute to them.
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That's where it begins and ends for me and these songs were the ones that touched me the deepest. It was like I was laying hold of some part of me that I didn't even know was there until I let it out.
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My mother always wanted me to be a jazz singer, but I always wanted to be raunchy.
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I was a sloppy kid, wanted to be just wild.
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When Malcolm X was assassinated I was working at the Apollo. They brought his body to the Unity Funeral Home, which was around the corner.
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I like to shop, but I don't like to go out to dances.
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I figured I could do "It's A Man's, Man's, Man's World" because I believe it's the truth.
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A few years ago, I thought, I'll never make it. I started to go to the doctor to help me lose weight.
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In some ways, it's my rage that keeps me going.
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Country music has the great stories.
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My mother used to play nothing but Billie Holiday.
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Jazz took too much discipline. You have to come in at the right place, which is different than me singing the blues, where I can sing, 'Oh, baby,' if there's a pause in the melody. With jazz, you better leave that space open, or put in something real cool.
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I'm not a braggart, but when I was a little girl people used to come from all over Hollywood to hear me sing.
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The music was thunder and joy. Lightning bolts of happiness and praise, foot-stomping, dance-shouting, good-feeling singing from the soul.
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I was originally like a punker, know what I mean, like the punks are today, I'd spit in a minute.
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I wanna show that gospel, country, blues, rhythm and blues, jazz, rock 'n' roll are all just really one thing. Those are the American music and that is the American culture.
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When I'm performing for the people, I am me, then. I am that little girl who, when she was five years old, used to sing at church. Or I'm that 15-year-old young lady who wanted to be grown and wanted to sing and couldn't wait to be smokin' a cigarette, you know?
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People always say 'Etta, you know what your problem is? You're neither fish nor fowl. There is no place to rack you.' When I would go in a record shop, you might find one or two records by me in different stacks.
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Even as a little child, I've always had that comedian kind of attitude.
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The two things you can't fake are good food and good music.
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It feels so good to be happy.
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I've gone through so much in my life. I should have been dead a long time ago, but I am still here, and I'm the happiest I've ever been.
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And as I started reaching deeper I realized that most of the blues of that day was done by men. Women just didn't have the nerve.