I've come to understand my role. On some level, I provide the context for them to shine. I also know my role is the steward of the songs, and the center point, the artist that the stuff all revolves around. But I really try to honor that.
I started writing songs when I was 10. It was a natural way to express myself as a kid. It wasn't until I started listening to jazz, joined the choir and picked up a guitar that my little hobby became something far more serious.
But my role is to just apply the skills I've learned over the years: you listen to the guitar, you listen to the vocal melodies, you listen to the rhythm, and you come up with something that helps you take the song somewhere.
The 'Maybe Memories' album I remember having and listening until it broke. I remember it skipped one day; two or three songs wouldn't play on my CD player because I listened to it so much.
Crying is one of the highest devotional songs. One who knows crying, knows spiritual practice. If you can cry with a pure heart, nothing else compares to such a prayer. Crying includes all the principles of Yoga.
My friends ask me what it's like moving from Vermont to L.A., but no matter where I am, I pretty much just end up sitting in coffee shops, thinking about songs.
When I'm up on stage, I don't think about anything except the song I'm singing. Anyway, the majority of my audience is female, and I can't think that many of them want to see me a French maid outfit somehow!
When I'm doing interviews, I'm doing interviews, and when I am writing, I'm writing. I sit there with a musician and I write. It's the same process since I started writing in my twenties. I like to come in and leave with a finished song.
I knew that collaborating on songwriting would be difficult for a lot of people, because I was known very much, for my independence and the fact that I wrote these quirky songs that were not typical structure, not typical sound - you know, really ori...
If you consider the definition of authenticity, it's saying something and actually doing it. I write my own songs. I made my own videos. I pick my producers. Nothing goes out without my permission. It's all authentic.
The nice thing about doing a pop opera - in the way that doing, say, 'Miss Saigon' or 'Les Miz' would be - is that, because the convention is set from the beginning that this is an opera and everything is sung, there is never that feeling of 'Why is ...
I wouldn't have made it past the first round of American Idol auditions. It was months before our first song was recorded. The guys were like, 'Just seeng!' And I was like, 'I don't know how to seeng! Can't I just play the triangle?'
When I was 5, I started taking singing lessons, and then, after 'School of Rock,' I started taking guitar lessons. I would always write songs and play them for my friends, and I would play my guitar on the set a lot.
I feel like I want to write some songs and I don't know how to go about doing it. Usually it's the lyrics that are a problem, and I think I am not really cut out to be a lyricist.
When you choose your life, ignore people, when you make it in life, remember some friends, when you sing a song, praise your source, when predicaments arises, stand your ground.
People ask me how I make music. I tell them I just step into it. It's like stepping into a river and joining the flow. Every moment in the river has its song.
Writing songs with Brian and performing them with Al Jardine, Dennis Wilson, Carl Wilson, David Marks, Bruce Johnston and many other brilliant musicians over the years is my legacy, and something of which I am very proud and protective.
Wer nicht liebt Wein, Weib, und Gesang, Der bleibt ein Narr sein Lebenlang (He who loves not Wine, Women and Song Remains a fool his whole life long)
When I'm not in the booth, I'm one of the most laid-back guys. But growing up, I liked DMX, Jay-Z, 50 Cent, and T.I. - dudes that went all out on the track. My first songs were energetic because I liked their energy.
Sometimes I feel like I'm taking on a role when I'm writing a song, and it doesn't always have to be true. I'm not sitting in my room crying with my guitar, writing a slow solo about a depressing breakup; that's not me.
I took her to bed with silk and song 'Lay still, my love, I won’t be long, I must prepare my body for passion.' 'O, your body you give, but all else you ration...
