I don't believe in an annual dose of film music for the sake of it being film music. If we program film music, it will be because there is a real artistic reason for doing so.
Country fans need to support country music by buying albums and concert tickets for traditional artists or the music will just fade away. And that would be really sad.
I was totally involved in Bobby's World from the time we started the idea to sitting with the artists on how he would look, to the script meetings, the music, the lyrics, the songs.
When I started out, I wanted to be the kind of artist who could play the CMA Music Festival and then turn around and play Bonnaroo, and I've managed to do both.
In country music, there are certain female artists, like Gretchen Wilson, where you're going to find lesbians because they're responding to that more aggressive side.
Videos have to go hand in hand with your music, so that's why, ultimately, they should be created by the artist. And if they're not, it doesn't really add up to me.
Some artists are bound to an image: Bob Marley has dreadlocks, Matisyahu has a beard. But that's a reminder that the whole thing is not about style. It's about music.
One thing that really appeals to me is this idea of music being a living thing that has an evolution that, in a way, enables the artist to sell a process rather than a piece of product.
There's this thing called compulsory licensing law that allows artists through the record companies to take your music at will without your permission.
I don't mind putting my heart out there for the audience, and for the country music fans... to be vulnerable with them... that's my job as an artist.
When people like your music because it has vulnerable honesty, and you're able to comfortably admit to flaws and imperfections, then that's the most liberating thing about being an artist.
The feeling of an evolution is a constant for every artist who is pursuing the search of refinement and enlargement of his/her own means of expression.
Every man, and for stronger reasons, every artist, wants to be recognized. So do I.
Be your own artist, and always be confident in what you're doing. If you're not going to be confident, you might as well not be doing it.
Our photographs are filthier and our stories are more disgusting. We make no effort to be artistic.
Just as the bird sings or the butterfly soars, because it is his natural characteristic, so the artist works.
I've dated the sweet mama's boy, the musician rocker, the struggling artist - basically a lot of people without jobs.
Magic is always there. Sometimes it just takes an artist to find it and show the rest of us where to look.
Folk rock was my real roots. I did a few gigs as a folk artist, in the style of Fairport Convention.
I am not a painter, nor an artist. Therefore I can see straight, and that may be my undoing.
Here in England, everyone's a pop star, innit, whereas in America they believe in the term artist.
