There are certain sounds that I’ve found work well in nearly any context. Their function is not so much musical as spatial: they define the edges of the territory of the music.

I don’t think anyone ever plans to change line-ups, but it’s something that comes with being in bands. I was in a band once and there were always problems – members come and go – and some of the world’s biggest bands have changed line-ups loads!

I’ve got my Grammys on top of my piano and I look at them when I play.

I taught myself to play the guitar by listening to Paul Simon records, working it out note by note. He is an incredibly intelligent musician. He’s not someone who has a natural outpouring of melody like McCartney or Dylan, who are just terribly prolific with musical ideas.

Five or six songs leaked from the original version of ‚Encore.‘ So I had to go in and make new songs to replace them.

A lot of people don’t realise I came out of the Smoky Mountains with a load of songs.

When we started, a lot of bands sounded really different from one another.

I can’t make a song for a particular person or demographic. If I love it, I’m gonna do it. I have to perform it for the rest of my life. A song is like a tattoo – you can never get away from it.

I think music is something that can, and should, be used to get you into different things because eventually what goes up must come down – we’re not going to be the number one group in the world forever – so you have to have something else to fall back on.

Most rock journalism is people who can’t write, interviewing people who can’t talk, for people who can’t read.

‚Nothin‘ on You‘ by B.o.B was the first song where I heard myself on the radio. I’d been trying my whole career to write a song like that, which incorporates live instruments with hip-hop and singing.

I didn’t have nothin‘ going for me… school, home… until I found something I loved, which was music, and that changed everything.

I’ve accomplished enough with the music that I haven’t had to go out there and do other things to over-saturate.

I listen to music all day every day. I can’t not listen to music. It’s kind of scary how much I listen to music, but it’s what I love, and it’s all I care about, so I’m good with it.

Anything that encourages people to pick up an instrument and play, I’m fully behind.

I always use Michael as, first and foremost, a vocal inspiration, and ‚Off the Wall‘ was definitely the one that made me feel like I could sing.

Most of those melodies are me trying to find out what notes fit, and then hitting ones that don’t fit in a very interesting way.

I was 14, and I fell in love with Pink Floyd.

I’ve been in the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus since I was 8.

I cannot with any real integrity perform songs I’ve done for 25 years. I don’t need the money. What I need is to feel that I am not letting myself down as an artist and that I still have something to contribute.

I started playing violin in the 5th grade. They had a program in school where you could get out of class to go play instruments. So I raised my hand, left out of class, me and a bunch of my homeboys, just to get out of class for that day. They asked what instrument you wanted to play and I picked the violin.

I’ve never wanted to use my age as a gimmick, as something that would get me ahead of other people. I’ve wanted the music to do that.

I don’t know which will go first – rock ‚n‘ roll or Christianity.

Thirty-three-years-old, still creating art. It’s rage, it’s creativity, it’s pain, it’s hurt, but it’s the opportunity to still have my voice get out there through music.

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 never intended for the Monster Ball to be a religious experience, it just became one.

I don’t know how the rap game is, because I’m a fan of reality, and the rap game’s entertainment.

A chorus is not easy.

Madonna, I think, is the greatest visual musical artist that we’ve ever had. If you look at her photo log, the photographers that she was able to work with throughout her career framed her in the proper way. It was the proper context. It was that visual that made sure that everything was gonna cut through in a certain way.

I feel connected to my generation through the music, but I also fear for us. We’re in a very self-destructive state where we’re addicted to outside opinions and we all feel like we have fans.

The Heads were the only band on that scene that had a groove.

One of my big fears is people saying my songs are all starting to sound the same.

If it’s good music, it’s good music.

There’s something missing in the music industry today… and it’s music. Songs you hear don’t last, it’s just product fed to you by the industry.

For the chorus of ‚Secrets,‘ we used The Romantics‘ ‚Talking in Your Sleep‘ and ‚Pale Shelter‘ by Tears for Fears. It’s like hip-hop: just grab it.

When you listen to Ray Charles, there’s never any doubt whose voice that is.

In case you’re wondering whether I lip synch, the answer is no… people think so because I sound so good.

There, in the chords and melodies, is everything I want to say. The words just jolly it along. It’s always been my way of expressing what, for me, is inexpressible by any other means.

I find in my poetry and prose the rhythms and imagery of the best – I mean, when I’m at my best – of the good Southern black preachers. The lyricism of the spirituals and the directness of gospel songs and the mystery of blues are in my music or in my poetry and prose, or I missed everything.

I was always singing but didn’t plan on pursuing it seriously. When I got to New York City when I was 18, I started playing in clubs in Brooklyn – I have good friends and devoted fans on the underground scene, but we were playing for each other at that point – and that was it.

Mozart’s music is so pure and beautiful that I see it as a reflection of the inner beauty of the universe.

If I’m gonna write songs about my exes, they can write songs about me. That’s how it works.

Lyrics are the only thing to do with music that haven’t been made easier technically.

In Hawaii, some of the biggest radio stations are reggae. The local bands are heavily influenced by Bob Marley.

If you ever see young artists, and they’re not sounding good, they sound good. They’re good singers. They wouldn’t be where they are if they didn’t sound good. It’s their nerves. Any time you see your favorite artist, and he’s or she’s screwing up or not hitting those notes, it’s not because she can’t hit it or she can’t sing; he or she is scared.

To all the musicians, to the Academy, with all due respect, reggaeton is part of our Latin culture. And its representing as much as any other genre at the worldwide level.

One day, I’ll be listening to a bunch of Ray Charles, the next day it’s nothing but Red Hot Chili Peppers. The next day it might be Tupac all day.

Singing into a microphone and learning to play an instrument – learning to do your craft – that’s the most important thing! It’s not about what goes on in a computer!

I play the harmonica. The only way I can play is if I get my car going really fast, and stick it out the window.

Human beings love poetry. They don’t even know it sometimes… whether they’re the songs of Bono, or the songs of Justin Bieber… they’re listening to poetry.

My favorite artists always documented emotion. Marvin Gaye and Al Green and Sade and Aaliyah.

If people take anything from my music, it should be motivation to know that anything is possible as long as you keep working at it and don’t back down.

I really started writing music to challenge myself, to see what I could write.

I was part of Jazzercise class. It was an aerobics routine accompanied by loud music, sounding quite awful to me. Jazzercise was popular in the ’80s and ’90s.

We don’t make music – it makes us.

I can operate in half-a-song format.

One of the interesting things about having little musical knowledge is that you generate surprising results sometimes; you move to places you wouldn’t if you knew better.

I always use the same guitar; I got this guitar years and years ago for nine pounds. It’s still got the same strings on it.

Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life.

Open Graph is a language for structuring content and sharing that goes on in other apps, and we’re continuing to build it out longer term. But we found we need to build more specific experiences around categories like music or movies. Where we’ve taken the time to build those specific experiences, stuff has gone quite well.

Whenever I make music, it reflects where I’m at mentally.