Songwriters, you have to work - you have to wait for residuals. You have to pray that the song's going to be a hit. And then a year later, you might get a check.
That's part of the curse: If you're gonna play the song, you better play it. I've tried to phone in 'Jeremy' a few times, and it's tough. It doesn't work.
Fun is when you're writing a song and you're trying a rough shot at a demo and... it works. That's when it's fun. After that, it's work.
So many women have experienced horrific forms of male violence throughout their lives, and why isn't there a song about how you get depressed because of it?
I totally agree with equal rights and women's causes, and most of my songs are woman-power, but I don't want to be labelled at 20 years old.
Insanity is the only real escape from the banality of our lives. - Clara Bayliss
You could name practically any problem in the hood and there'd be a rap song for you.
The song we’re composing already exists in potential. Our work is to find it.
A bad conscience is easier to cope with than a bad reputation.
I just acquired a choir. I bought it for a song.
Laugh as much as you breathe and love as long as you live.
There's a punk-rock attitude, clearly, to 'Hated.' There's even a punk-rock attitude to 'The Hangover,' I think. We start the movie with a Glenn Danzig song.
In an age of incompetence, I've been able to last in this crazy business. I actually know how to play my ax and write a song. That's my job.
I had kids at age 47, and very late in life, and I'd been doing it for 30 straight years, writing songs, making a record and touring and starting the process right over.
There are now grandmothers and grandfathers coming to see us because they are of that age, they grew up in the '50s and '60s and they bring their sons and their daughters to hear the songs they heard when they were young.
At the age of eight, I discovered that I could write songs. My dad used to take them to the notary and register them so that nobody could steal them from me.
My nails are my rhythm section when I'm writing a song all alone. Some day, I may cut an album, just me and my nails.
They were so good that you just had to sing the song to them once and they got it. It's amazing. Sometimes it didn't come out the way you wanted, but it was good.
When I first started, my songs were the politics of anger. As I got older and hopefully wiser, I wanted to be part of the politics of answers.
The right song can turn an emperor into a laughingstock, can bring down dynasties.
Dream Song: The heavens Go with me.
