“I think music is such an extension of who we are, and the fact that I've gone through as much as I have, good, bad, and ugly, has really helped to shape the songs that I picked.” ThinkingFactsSongGoneShapesMusic IsUglyWho We AreExtensions Author:Demetria McKinney
“If I had to collaborate with anybody on a song, I would pick Kendrick Lamar because he is so dope as an artist and I love his hustle and his passion. He is fearless and the way he comes to the music is like we share the same passion for what we do and with somebody from the West. In my opinion that would be a great collaboration.” IfsWayWould BeArtistSongPassionOpinionShareMusic IsPicksWestFearlessCollaborationHustleDope Author:Adrian Marcel
“Because of the irresistible nature of our own Imagos, I think the replication of it in music is a siren song - we love those tormented songs, and we listen to them over and over and over the way that we smash ourselves into our lovers, or the same kind of lover, over and over. That drive is tireless, until it is resolved. And we can "enjoy" it safely through music, which is a simulacrum we have power over.” ThinkingWayKindSongEnjoyLoversMusic IsIrresistibleSirensSimulacrumReplicationSiren Song Author:Melissa Febos
“Irish music is guts, balls and feet music, yeah? It's frenetic dance music, yeah? Or it's impossibly sad like slow music, yeah? Yeah? And it also handles all sorts of subjects, from rebel songs to comical songs about sex, you know what I mean, yeah? Which I don't think people realize how much innuendo there is in Irish music.” PeopleThinkingKnowsMeanSongSexRealizingFeetSubjectsMusic IsBallsYeahHandleGutsRebelComicalDance MusicInnuendoIrish Music Author:Shane MacGowan
“Music is the universal language, it evokes an emotion in all of us. That, we can all look at each other and we may not speak the same language, but that song or that melody can make us feel the same thing. And we can look at each other and agree and be like, "that did something for us". It makes us feel unified and connected.” FeelsLooksMaySongSpeakLanguageEmotionMusic IsUniversalAgreeConnectedMelodyEvokeUnifiedUniversal Language Author:Kerry James Marshall
“The challenges change depending on the song. There are some songs where the lyrics are really a challenge and then there are other songs where the lyrics are there and the music is a challenge. And then you've got rock songs where the challenge is the tightness of the arrangement with the band. The music and the lyrics are there, but it's a challenge to get the arrangement correct. So I wouldn't be able to point to one thing. What the challenge is changes all of the time.” SongChallengesMusic Is Author:Jonathan Jackson
“I'm not playing up to pretend, I don't live above my means. In my song "96 Cris" I say, "...My bills too low for me to fall off." Honestly, if I never did anything again with music, because I put out my own music, I could pay my bills, forever. I can pay my mortgage off my old music. Of course, you probably wouldn't see me in my Lamborghini but, do you really need a Lambo? That's really what you have to ask yourself.” MeanSongFallForeverMusic IsHonestlyMortgage Author:Dom Kennedy
“I always listen to music when I write! I basically make a playlist for every essay; sometimes it's just one song, or three songs, over and over and over. I sort of find the emotional pitch of the piece, and then match music to it, and then the music becomes a shortcut to the feeling, so I can enter it and work anywhere: on planes, cafes, at work, the train.” WritingSometimesFeelingsSongEmotionalMusic IsTrainEssaysListening To Music Author:Melissa Febos
“It'd be negligent to say that I don't want to be at the top of the charts. Of course I do, it's proof that your song is being heard. But I think it's more about the work for me and being proud of what I'm doing in music than what people think about my music. I want to like my music before you like it. I don't want to sell anything that I don't really like. I don't want to sell myself short just to get to the top of the charts. It doesn't feel that great. Feeling proud of your work feels greater than being at the top of the charts.” PeopleThinkingFeelingsSongProudMusic IsBe ProudYou Like ItProud Of You Author:Brandy Norwood
“Music is my natural language. I have always had a form of dyslexia. I never studied music formally, so emotions come directly from the source into song mode. As a composer, it may be fortuitous. What I feel is what you get.” SongLanguageNaturalEmotionMusic IsComposerDyslexia Author:Lucy Simon
“My favorite kind of music is the stuff that stops time. You put something on to sit there and let an experience go through you. To look at yourself clearly through a song. It's true of all art, all mediums, but for some reason music has a direct line straight into people.” PeopleKindArtReasonSongMusic IsDirectMy FavoriteLook At YourselfStop Time Author:Jeff Buckley
“People always say that music is a universal language. It was very, very true. We could show up anywhere with any people speaking different languages and we could just be like, "You want to play that song? Yeah, okay." We would usually want to play Latin American songs, and they would usually want to play Santana or Jimi Hendrix and stuff like that. So we would trade off. So yeah, we were able to make a lot of friends that way and meet a lot of local musicians. It was a great experience.” PeopleDifferentSongLanguageLike YouMusicianMusic IsOkayTradeLatinLatin AmericaHendrixVery True Author:Jherek Bischoff
“A lot of people are really quick to say, "That song sounds like this." Or you - "He's tryin' to sound like this." And I'm always like, "You're damn right I am. That's how - that's why we're all here." You know, we all grew up idolizing another musician. That's how this works. That's how music is created.” PeopleSongLike YouMusicianMusic Is Author:Bruno Mars
“I have a song entitled "Just Ain't My Day" that is a straight country song almost. My vocals are very soulful it's a different kind of record but people's response to it is beyond powerful. Proving that good music is good music regardless of the genre.” KindDifferentCountrySongPowerfulProveMusic IsResponseDifferent KindsSoulful Author:K.Michelle
“The exciting part about sitting down and writing songs, playing shows, or being a musician in general is that you never know where those songs and that music is going to take you. There's such a cool feeling about that the phone could ring tomorrow and someone could say "he guess what? your song..." That really is cool.” WritingFeelingsSongTomorrowMusicianMusic IsExcitingRings Author:Graham Colton
“I think that if you listen to the same exact genre of music that you play, it is so easy to be influenced by it. There will be times where we are writing a song, and then realize that it songs like something we just heard on the radio. There was a while when we were writing, that I didn't listen to music because I didn't want to be influenced.” ThinkingWritingSongEasyRealizingMusic IsListening To Music Author:Taylor Jardine
“The fun part, I will admit this much, there is a period when listening to my music is fun, and that's when I'm making it. There's a tiny little window before something gets old, but after it's come to fruition. There's a little window there where I can listen to a song probably about five times, and I'll really think it's awesome. That's kind of the period that lets me know when I - 99 percent of the time, that period is right about whether a song is going to be a keeper for an album or just a throwaway track that never gets - in that little window.” ThinkingKindSongFunListeningMusic IsWindowLet MeTrack Author:RJD2
“Whereas when you perform, the song is done. The music is out. People know it already. You can interpret it differently, the band can perform it differently, so I like the freedom of performing.” PeopleDoneSongMusic IsPerforming Author:NAO
“I used to practice piano for hours, and now, with a synthesizer, you can input the music and the machine perfects the song. That's why we have so many people in the music business who should be plumbers. They don't really understand music because they haven't been trained.” PeopleSongHoursMusic IsMusic BusinessPlumber Author:Quincy Jones
“Cornelius Cardew very famous in Britain, because he was the darling of the avant-garde, and he played in a band called AMM, which was an improvising band in the '60s. Paul McCartney used to come watch them. Later on in life, he became disenchanted with avant-garde music, because he felt it couldn't reach the public. It didn't have a wide enough appeal. So he'd take these tunes of old English folk songs and write Stalinist lyrics over the top of them. I do think that when he changed to folk songs, he actually lost the tiny audience he already had, which is quite interesting.” ThinkingWritingEnoughSongInterestingAudienceChangedMusic IsVery Famous Author:Alasdair MacLean
“Sometimes I'll write a song first and then I'm like, "Oh this person will be great on this song." But there are some artists I know what want, like off the top I knew I wanted Brandy and Faith Evans. Their music is like the soundtrack to my life, so it was a personal thing for me. So once they said yes, I wrote songs specifically for them.” WritingSometimesArtistSongMusic IsBrandy Author:Robert Glasper
“I'm very concerned with the healing process of a song and music in general. I think that's why I make music - it heals me and I'm extremely sensitive to people who tell me that this or that song made them feel better or helped them go through a difficult time in their life. I think that music is almost medicine. I don't know if that's my philosophy, but that's my thought process.” PeopleThinkingPhilosophySongDifficultHealingMusic IsConcernedHealSensitiveFeel BetterMy ThoughtsDifficult Times Author:Olivia Merilahti
“The one good thing about a movie and music and stuff like that: Sometimes it's a counterpoint between the movie and the music itself, the difference and the tension they build together. I think that could be something that helped with me, because when I write songs now, I write lyrics a bit like that. I try to make the music be an interesting twist on the lyrics and help tell the story in a - I don't tell crazy stories, you know? So a lot of times, the twist is in the subtleties. The twist is in the way the story's told.” ThinkingWritingTryingSometimesHelpingTogetherSongInterestingCrazyMusic IsGood ThingsTensionSubtlety Author:Patrick Watson
“I think my philosophy on music is sort of like the difference between religion and spirituality or religion and faith. There's a lot of bullshit in the music industry. It's really tough to get a leg up and navigate around your gender and stereotypes. You feel hopeless, [but] all of that disappears the minute that I start writing a song. Then I record something and have that magical feeling. You have to have the negative and the positive. Trying to own that and go to that place in yourself creatively is the most important thing.” ThinkingWritingTryingImportantPhilosophyFeelingsSongSpiritualityMusic IsToughNegativeGenderDisappearHopelessBullshitStereotypeMusic Industry Author:Haley Bonar
“I would go into my three different sisters' rooms in the early-mid '70s and they had very specific different tastes in music. I specifically remember lying on my different sisters' bedroom floors and listening to their record collections. And "Starship Trooper" was one of my sister Nancy's favorite songs and favorite album. Music is so defining for me. In the late '70s and early '80s, I worked in radio. When I was in high school, I worked at two different radio stations.” DifferentSchoolRememberLyingSongListeningMusic IsHigh SchoolMy SisterBedroomFavorite Song Author:Thomas Haden Church
“There's a vast ecosystem for music outside of Myspace and Facebook and you need to make sure that your music is in as many hands as possible. I wanted people to share my music and tell friends about me, and if you want to rely on word of mouth, you have to make it easy for people. I got lucky because I had a few songs that hit big and got a lot of links on blog posts.” PeopleSongEasyShareLuckyMusic IsRelyWord Of Mouth Author:Jonathan Coulton
“I think music is better listened to with other people. Music is better shared. It depends what situation you're in - if it's a song by Tom Waits, it can be nice to be on your own, but if it's something slightly more upbeat, it's amazing to be around people.” PeopleThinkingSongWaitingSituationNiceMusic IsBeing NiceUpbeat Author:Tom Odell
“Music is the highest art form.I still think that. I wish I was really talented in music because then I would be doing it. I felt that I could write a decent song, but it was a big struggle. It took a lot of time and effort for me, whereas a lot of my peers and other people seemed to have a much easier relationship to it. But I profoundly love music, and I still dream that I might one day try to write some new songs and record something - just for myself, to see what would happen.” PeopleThinkingWritingTryingArtDreamSongWishEffortStruggleOne DayMusic IsDecent Author:Johan Renck
“Music to me is a way of communicating without words.I think music is second to only smell in its ability to transport you without you wanting to be transported. Like if you smell your ex boyfriend's cologne. Like somewhere in public you sort of flinch and look over your shoulder. You wonder if that person is around. Same thing happens with music. It's really influenced my life a lot, even in times when I didn't want it too. A song will affect you in such a cheesy corny way, but you are affected so deeply in the moment despite yourself.” ThinkingMomentsSongAbilityWonderMusic IsCommunicateThings HappenOver YouCornyTransportCheesy Author:Crosby Loggins
“When I listen to my songs, they seem like pieces of music or art, like a painting that you look at. The reality is that, yes, when I wrote the songs upstairs or wherever, I was writing very specifically about my life or a specific subject matter that's very personal. I've never shied away from that. The vocals and the performance that come after the record, I don't think of that as confessional, but the core of the music is completely. It makes sense that people would see that as being the main thing. I guess not everyone is able to speak so candidly.” PeopleThinkingWritingArtRealitySongSpeakPaintingMusic IsMake Sense Author:Martha Wainwright
“I think music is just a great place to focus your energy and your feelings. If you're young, you can take all that stuff that you feel so intensely about - especially these days, but I'm not going to go there - but to take all those feelings and put them into music was such a big deal for me to be able to play punk rock songs. It was such a release for me. It's a good thing for parents to support that.” ThinkingFeelingsSongEnergyParentSupportFocusMusic IsGood ThingsPunkPunk Rock Author:Ali Koehler
“A lot of Gorillaz songs were very personal. I mean, that's why it was interesting, because it wasn't music being made for a cartoon. It was something different. It was a much more emotional affair. I wasn't necessarily thinking in the third-person then.” ThinkingMeanDifferentSongInterestingEmotionalMusic IsAffairCartoon Author:Damon Albarn
“Sometimes I'm trying to communicate a feeling. Sometimes I can't piece it together into any kind of coherant thesis. I'm just trying to evoke some kind of mood, and put some kind of idea in somebody's head. If Marshall McLuhan or Harold Innis were looking at it, they would tell you that the genre of rock music isn't the best way to deliver a political message because it distorts it, it makes it into entertainment. Perhaps the best political message is just to speak it to somebody. I think that's something I'm always writing about in songs, just how to mediate, how to present something.” ThinkingWritingTryingKindSometimesFeelingsTogetherPoliticalSongSpeakMusic IsCommunicateMoodRock MusicThesis Author:A.C. Newman
“There's so many songs about heartbreak that exist this in the world, because music is somehow the perfect medium to express something like this.” WorldSongPerfectMusic Is Author:Bjork
“I know where my heart is and I know that I can make people feel something with my music. I'm quite confident in what I am doing, so if I can also make a song that people want to put in ten times during a party and makes them happy, then I think that is also good. I feel that playfulness is something that has entered my life a lot more in the last couple of years. I'm not taking everything too seriously. I think that is something that comes with age - I hope. I feel that music is much more fun for me than it has ever been.” PeopleThinkingHeartAgeSongFunPartyCoupleMy HeartMusic Is Author:Ane Brun
“The school systems at my childhood had enough money or enough parent involvement that they felt like learning music and songs, and exploring the whole pop or classical canon, were just as important as algebra or biology. Music is such a visceral and tactile experience for a kid, and to just replace that with video games or something that doesn't have the same sort of physical impact would definitely be a poor choice, and have a negative impact.” ImportantEnoughKidsSchoolSongChoicesParentPoorChildhoodMusic IsNegativeBiologyExploringInvolvementAlgebra Author:Carrie Brownstein
“Music is for making people happy, lyrics tell them who they are. Everybody is free to interpret the music, as they want. The lyrics of my songs are about different things, but it's all about my issues.” PeopleDifferentSongMusic Is Author:Gustav Ejstes
“People around me are always an inspiration due to their love of the music and they help me to generate ideas for music. But it's really the passion and drive I have for my music that keeps me connected. I recorded my first song in the studio at 8 years old and I've taken it seriously since then. Making music is fun to me so I aim to translate those feelings into the music.” PeopleHelpingFeelingsInspirationSongPassionFunTakenMusic IsAimHelp MeTranslate Author:Chingy
“Brian Eno records and music became a huge obsession of mine in college, in a way that a pop song can provide solace. I don't know if it's shallow or silly, but it meant so much to me.” SongCollegeMusic IsSillyObsessionShallowSolacePop Song Author:Greg Mottola
“Years later, you can hear a song, and it brings you back right to that moment, what was happening at that time, whether it was a relationship or a difficult time, or maybe a great time in your life, and you had that album you were listening to. Twenty years later, you can put on that song you fell in love to or your heart was broken to, and you hear that song and it brings you right back there. I think music is the most powerful tool we have.” ThinkingHeartMomentsSongDifficultPowerfulBrokenListeningMusic IsMost PowerfulDifficult Times Author:Balthazar Getty
“As far as the music being inspired by Seattle, I think it's in some of the songs. Seattle is a really beautiful place in the right light, it's perched on a pretty unique geographic setting.” ThinkingBeautifulSongMusic IsUniqueInspiredReally BeautifulBeautiful Places Author:Robin Pecknold
“What I like about music is the songs you can remember the lines of in a single second.” RememberSongLinesMusic Is Author:Karl Lagerfeld
“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.” PeopleFeelsWellsIdeasReasonPlaySongPaintingKissingMusic IsSelfishFeel GoodGood IdeasSelfish Reasons Author:Dave Matthews
“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.” WayFeelsSoulSometimesMovingSongActingEmotionSourceMusic IsSingingIncrediblesIntenseYour SoulAmandaIntense Emotions Author:Amanda Seyfried
“Out of all the artistic things I do, music is the most rewarding because it's so hard to write songs.” WritingHardSongMusic IsArtistic Author:Gwen Stefani
“I think music is the greatest art form that exists, and I think people listen to music for different reasons, and it serves different purposes. Some of it is background music, and some of it is things that might affect a person's day, if not their life, or change an attitude. The best songs are the ones that make you feel something.” PeopleIfsThinkingFeelsPersonsArtDifferentReasonMightFormPurposeSongAttitudeMusic IsMusicalBackgroundsListening To MusicBackground Music Author:Eddie Vedder