album quotes

I knew the second I finished the first record – ‚House Of Balloons‘ – and had all this material leftover that a trilogy would be best.

Even though I’ve been putting out bodies of work for years, ‚Beauty Behind the Madness‘ felt like the beginning.

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.

I don’t think I’d ever make an album of just covers because I love writing my own music.

A development deal is where they’re giving you recording time and money to record, but not promising that they’ll put an album out.

‚Trilogy‘ was more of a claustrophobic body of work. Before it was released, I hadn’t left my city for 21 years, and I had never been on a plane, not once. I spent my entire life on one setting; that’s probably why pieces of the album feel like one long track, because that’s what my life felt like. It felt like one long song.

I wrote ‚Channel Orange‘ in two weeks. The end product wasn’t always that gritty, real-life depiction of the real struggle that happened.

The album requires a certain focus of mine that I can’t really explain – let’s just say it’s all I can really do while I’m doing it.

I really appreciate the moments that I was able to win rap album of the year or whatever.

George Carlin’s album, ‚Class Clown,‘ came out when I was in high school. I memorized a lot of that album. I’d come home from school, put it on, and listen over and over. I started memorizing it. I don’t even know why. I loved it so much I memorized it.

Anybody with a sense of humor is going to put on my album and laugh from beginning to end.

It’s easy to make an album full of great songs. But I want people to go for the ride. The songs have to make sense together.

I kinda like the idea of having an album that’s all me.

I always say this about my music, and music in general: Music is like a time capsule. Each album reflects what I’m going through or what’s going on in my life at that moment.

When ‚Paul’s Boutique‘ came out, I was one of the fans that didn’t get it.

I think my first album opened a lot of doors for me to push the freedom of speech to the limit.

However, there’s no theme or concept behind Heathen, just a number of songs but somehow there is a thread that runs through it that is quite as strong as any of my thematic type albums.

I think that, whatever happens, I’m just happy I’ve written those songs and I’ve made an album. That’s really big for me, and I’m proud of that.

At 57, to have a No. 1 album, I wasn’t expecting it.

‚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.‘

Until it’s on the radio or online, it’s not real. With U2, our album isn’t finished until it’s in the stores.

I’m not going to make a song just to make a song. The day that I make an album, it’s so that people really know what Bad Bunny’s about.

I hope that what you take away from my album is not just the music – which I did want to be fun, and I did want it to be about individuality, but please also take away from it that there’s no dream that’s too big.

‚House of Balloons‘ was actually supposed to have more songs than it does.

‚House of Balloons‘ was special because I had no deadlines, and nobody knew me, so there were no expectations. Spent a year making it perfect. Every song had at least, like, 7 different versions to them before picking the right one.

‚Two Voices,‘ from my album with Peter Schwalm, is an intact dream-poem. I awoke one night with an image of a piece of paper and all the words of the poem written on it, so I just blundered down to the kitchen table and ‚copied it out.‘

I never listen to ‚Nevermind.‘ I haven’t listened to it since we put it out. That says something.

I made an album I’m very proud of, and that’s about it.