Song Quotes
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Right before 'Brian's Song' there was a period when I was very despondent, broke, depressed; my first marriage was on the rocks. The role of Gale Sayers had been cast with Lou Gossett, and then he hurt himself playing basketball. I was called in to read for the role. I was their last choice, and I knew it.
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For myself music definitely informs my emotions. And I can literally play a song that will get me where I need to be emotionally. I don't have to think about the tragic things that happened in my life or the greatest things that happened in my life.
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One of the lyrics from Bono that always sticks with me is 'Where the Streets Have No Name.' Just the name of the song, that sort of oneness, and there isn't any division in yourself, and your just at peace and fired up at the same time.
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I have tried to write songs quickly that get scrapped. I've also taken a long time on songs that get scrapped because you can over-think something, and you've squeezed the life out of it. As opposed to work of art, it looks like a really great work of craftsmanship.
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In order to make a normal-sized record, a singer songwriter should have a couple dozen finished songs. Once they go through the process of production, the ones that scream out at you that they're finished are the ones that make the record.
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We had various kinds of tape-recorded concerts and popular music. But by the end of the flight what we listened to most was Russian folk songs. We also had recordings of nature sounds: thunder, rain, the singing of birds. We switched them on most frequently of all, and we never grew tired of them. It was as if they returned us to Earth.
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If somebody else wanted to do a song for McDonald's, that's up to them. I wouldn't do something like that, but whatever.
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I saw 'Rolling Stone' magazine once, and they were talking about the top 50 songs, and there wasn't one Sly song; how does that happen? But, Sly isn't the type to brown nose for props. He's always known what he had, what he was capable of; I'm just proud that he took the time and effort to put it to music.
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It's a dangerous game to write a song for a person you don't know. It feels disingenuous.
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We want to pull out songs from the American song book, and we want to make them palatable for a modern audience.
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Pronouns really don't matter in a song - 'I' or 'he' or 'she' or even subscribing a lyric to an inanimate object.
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In the end, I get a really good song, and in the end, I get the hits. Yeah, I'm that good.
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"I'll Still Destroy You" song is lovingly talking about how we change our states of mind, whether it's weed or wine or whatever. It's an ingredient in my life. Sometimes we overindulge ourselves. I've always been okay with that in a funny way. I sing about that stuff a lot, and the dangers of it.
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I can't start my day without hearing 'Waiting On the World to Change' by John Mayer. It's my alarm clock and my favorite song.
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The thing that will never go away is that connection you make with a band or a song where you're moved by the fact that it's real people making music. You make that human connection with a song like 'Let It Be' or 'Long and Winding Road' or a song like 'Bohemian Rhapsody' or 'Roxanne,' any of those songs. They sound like people making music.
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When I think of folk music, I think of topical songs. And I don't write topical songs.
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Usually, if someone wants an inspiring-type number - patriotic, gospel, big love song - then I think you do think of me.
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Both Springsteen and Michael Jackson, who had these huge productions, could always scale them back down to just a song and a melody. All of that influences me. I also try to be a fictional writer, and sometimes I get close, but the things that resonate the most with me - and with everyone else - is what's real.
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You don't have to be as good a writer to write a song; it's a very different process to writing straight prose. To learn how to write prose takes a lot of years of practice.
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I think I was 15 the first time I wrote a good song.
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Loads of verses don't make it into the finished song.
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I've always sung. My dad had a song in his heart and on his lips 24/7. A lot of the time, it was the same song and the same phrase over and over again.
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If I was to play any song for anybody asking, 'What is metal about?' I'd just play 'Master of Puppets.' The progressions and the bridge are brilliant.
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I like being in a recording studio. I like watching a song go from the simplicity of the original music.
