I have never used Auto-Tune in a live television performance, and I have never used Auto-Tune in any of my concerts. That is a promise.

I’ve always done whatever I want and always been exactly who I am.

If you look deep enough you will see music; the heart of nature being everywhere music.

I’m such an emotional and sensitive person, so it only makes sense that my songs are as well.

I pay attention to lyrics and I know what rap fans care about. I try to write for the average listener and I’m conscious of the mainstream without selling out.

The truth of it is that every singer out there with songs on the radio is raising the next generation, so make your words count.

Many of my fans often tell me that they listen to my songs to get through things. And therefore, obviously, I hope that they can picture being in a place where things are better… I hope my songs can bring people to a calm place.

Even if my songs are quite sad or quite dark, I don’t want my songs to make people sad. It’s very important for me that all my songs have some kind of hope or light.

I want to be a man who is truthful and who won’t let pride get in the way of my ripping myself open to my partner and saying, ‚Here I am. This is me.‘ I feel there’s something powerful when a man reaches a point in his life when he can be completely vulnerable.

I don’t know, I feel desperate when I sing. And I look desperate – it feels like I’m singing for my life, which makes me twitch, if that makes sense.

There’s poetry in being the band that can sell out Wembley but also makes a record in a garage. I don’t like doing what people expect me to do.

Every album, I make big records. I’m going to always make an anthem. That’s what I do.

I think music is one of the hero/sheroes of the African-American existence.

Because you have things like ‚American Idol‘ and you’ve got radio stations that play music made entirely by computers, it’s easy to forget there are bands with actual people playing actual instruments that rock.

I think I can keep a rhythm to a beat, but there are quite a few people who would argue with me.

Always prefer the plain direct word to the long, vague one. Don’t implement promises, but keep them.

If we are not ashamed to think it, we should not be ashamed to say it.

I didn’t try to copy my dad or fit into the pressure or the mold that everybody tried to make me fit into.

I don’t sing because I’m happy; I’m happy because I sing.

I think if I did something in the pop world right now, it would be for Rihanna. I’d love to do something production wise for her.

I say what I want to say and do what I want to do. There’s no in between. People will either love you for it or hate you for it.

Music is not math. It’s science. You keep mixing the stuff up until it blows up on you, or it becomes this incredible potion.

What’s the greater risk? Letting go of what people think – or letting go of how I feel, what I believe, and who I am?

I always wanted a great love affair: something that feels big and full, really honest, and enough. No moment should feel slight, false, or a little off. For me, it had to be everything.

My brother Bob doesn’t want to be in government – he promised Dad he’d go straight.

Writing music is just like writing a book.

The snow goose need not bathe to make itself white. Neither need you do anything but be yourself.

The thing about hip-hop today is it’s smart, it’s insightful. The way they can communicate a complex message in a very short space is remarkable.

‚In Utero‘ was the first time I’d made an album that reached into the dark side. I remember the conflict and the uncertainty. I remember all those things when I hear ‚Pennyroyal Tea.‘

Promise, large promise, is the soul of an advertisement.

When the whole world has their eyes on you, if you say something that doesn’t truly come from your spirit and your soul, or if you wear something that doesn’t come from your spirit and your soul, it’s an injustice to your position. And so, I’m really myself every single day and I do it because I know my fans would want me to.

Some people focus more on sonics. Some people focus more on story. I focus on both sonics and story.

In my father’s generation, the product was 80 percent of what you were putting into the world, and your personal life was 20 percent. It now seems that 80 percent of the product I put out is silly, made-up stories and what I’m wearing.

I leave the genre labeling to other people. I really do. If I were to think too hard about it, that would stifle you creatively. If you think too hard about who other people want you to be as an artist, it stops you from being who you want to be as an artist.

I just really want to get music out and tour and go places I’ve never been, and just do more videos. I love photography and videography, and so I really want to direct videos when I can.

In the 1960s, people were trying to get away from the pop song format. Tracks were getting longer, or much, much shorter.

I’d love it if everyone knew one Foo Fighters song.

I’m happy being myself, which I’ve never been before. I always hid in other people, or tried to find myself through the characters, or live out their lives, but I didn’t have those things in mine.

There is more to sex appeal than just measurements. I don’t need a bedroom to prove my womanliness. I can convey just as much sex appeal, picking apples off a tree or standing in the rain.

I’m totally myself.

Songs are my diaries; they always have been. You have to put your trust in everyone because putting down those real, personal details and thoughts that make a song authentic also opens you right up. I am constantly misunderstood; a lot of people just don’t get me.

I never thought, in my lifetime, that you’d be able to watch movies, read books and listen to music from a phone, but I guess the technology of tomorrow is here today.

I had to resign myself, many years ago, that I’m not too articulate when it comes to explaining how I feel about things. But my music does it for me, it really does.

Today you are you! That is truer than true! There is no one alive who is you-er than you!

I’d love to do a duet, always wanted to work with Madonna, but she never asked.

If we’re really honest with ourselves, most of us will admit that we want to impress people, and this is what’s causing us to do what we do.

Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are.

Sometimes we be playing the politics too much and forget who we are just to win.

Lots of songs aren’t even from my experiences, but they’re about accepting… the dark things about yourself.

I liberate minds with my music. That’s more important than liberating a few people from apartheid or whatever.

So there’s no guarantee if you like the music you will empathize with the culture and the people who made it. It doesn’t necessarily happen. I think it can, but it doesn’t necessarily happen. Which is kind of a shame.

I sing and play the guitar, and I’m a walking, talking bacterial infection.

The first rap CD that I had, it was so different for me. The energy, the wordplay, all that caught my attention, and I liked it.

When I heard the Pixies for the first time, I connected with that band so heavily I should have been in that band – or at least in a Pixies cover band.

To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.

One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals. And so when I hear about negative and false attacks, I really don’t invest any energy in them, because I know who I am.

I live half the year on Necker, a tiny island in the Caribbean, and it’s always full of people in party mode. Everyone comes up to the big house, and we’ll be dancing until the early hours to the island’s band, the Front Line.

As long as my music is real, it’s no limit to how many ears I can grab.

I would love to get Rihanna on a Khaled song. That’s my friend, but every time I’m around her, I get shy.

I’ve seen zero evidence of any nation on Earth other than Mexico even remotely having the slightest clue what Mexican food is about or even come close to reproducing it. It is perhaps the most misunderstood country and cuisine on Earth.

I’ve always tended to write songs prolifically.