Song Quotes
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You can pick songs that sound like hits, but if it's not something that somebody wants to tell their friends, 'Hey man, have you heard this song?' then I don't think it's worth it. The only way to get your music out there, is for someone to tell their friends about it.
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But the reality is when you write a song, you should be able to strip away all the instruments and just have a song right there with an acoustic guitar and a voice, and the song should be good.
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If someone wants to say 'I love you' in a straight play, they say it, and then it's the other person's turn to talk. But in a song, you can sing about it for another three minutes. The musical form has that unique opportunity to express at length what joy really feels like.
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My songs can make you cry, take you by surprise at the same time, can make you dry your eyes with the same rhyme
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When I'm making a song, I try not to think about audience or genres. It's free-flowing. Natural.
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I love a good old-school reggaeton song.
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But we used to go to flea markets and things, and look for old 78 records that had silly song titles.
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I'm so absolutely pro-Denver. I wrote a fake hip-hop song about Denver. I've been claiming Denver. Part of the joke of the song is nobody was really claiming Denver - no rappers, no comedians.
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'A Pirate Looks at 40,' we had to do that song. I've been covering that forever.
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They look for the top note to end every song. They don't know what they are singing about. There is no style.
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I love the song 'El Rey.' And for years, I never knew what the song was totally about. It was something new for me. I'd never sung a song in Spanish before. Then I got the translation and saw what a really cool song it was.
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Gandhi was only minding his own business when he took a walk to get some salt and ended up overthrowing the British Empire. You can't set out to overthrow an empire, but if you have to get some salt then get some salt. If you have to write some independent songs that are honest, just write them. If you have to do a day job stacking shelves, so be it.
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I think the music of the Fifties is really good. I suspect it’s much better musically than much of what’s available now. Not in terms of production, but in terms of content. One good believable song about some guy’s girlfriend and how they broke up - a sincere one - is better than twenty albums of English rock that’s ever been produced.
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I think if you can affect somebody's life with one song, that's such a powerful tool to reach millions of people on so many different levels.
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If there was a direct influence on a song, I never hid it.
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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.
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It's very rare that a song falls from your mind complete.
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I was invited to L.A. when I was 16 for a weekend-long songwriting session by a writer I had met through my voice teacher in Pittsburgh. My first hit, 'Hide Away,' was one of the songs written during those sessions. It was played for a radio rep who then started a new label; the song got a pretty organic start at radio and then took off.
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Love Me Do, the first song we recorded, John was supposed to sing the lead, but they changed their minds and asked me to sing lead because they wanted John to play harmonica.
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They keep the song as street as it needs to be. It's got a good catchy hook where it can do what it needs to do on the radio, but they keep the song street where it will keep credibility in the hood.
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I always had a standard of, back when I was doing the country music I always told people I would never record a song that I wouldn't sit down and sing in front of my mom and dad.
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It was such a sweet, sad song with such sweet, sad lyrics. Old-fashioned a little, but also timeless.
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Words are important to me, but a song can work and function and be a good song with words that are fairly standard. But really great lyrics can't rescue a dog of a song.
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I learned early in my writing career that if I try to tailor a song for someone else, I'm usually off base. They're usually looking for something from you with your character.
