With music, you often don’t have to translate it. It just affects you, and you don’t know why.

It seems almost backwards to me that my music seems the more emotional outlet, and the art stuff seems more about ideas.

Military justice is to justice what military music is to music.

‚Victory‘ is like, you won, so the question is, what? What did you win? I think that the songs go into that. It’s just about reaching a place in myself.

I don’t profess to have music as my big wheel and there are a number of other things as important to me apart from music. Theatre and mime, for instance.

I sing seriously to my mom on the phone. To put her to sleep, I have to sing ‚Maria‘ from West Side Story. When I hear her snoring, I hang up.

Of what use is a philosopher who doesn’t hurt anybody’s feelings?

I tell my fellow reggaetoneros, keep giving it your all and bring more creativity.

There are strings in the human heart that had better not be vibrated.

All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff.

I like being able to be on the inside of music, rather than on the outside listening to it.

Through Kurt I saw the beauty of minimalism and the importance of music that’s stripped down.

The Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor led to many very good things. If you follow the trail, it led to kicking Europeans out of Asia – that saved tens of millions of lives in India alone.

My mami and papi love my music. They’re always listening to the radio waiting for one of my songs to come on. And when it does, they turn up the volume – and turn it back down when it’s over.

You create a community with music, not just at concerts but by talking about it with your friends.

I don’t think I’d ever apologise for music I make, no.

My purpose is to make exciting music, and I feel like I’ll be doing that for the rest of my life, so there’s no pressure.

A man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car; but if he has a university education, he may steal the whole railroad.

Rap was more of a release for me, a journal.

I have a very eclectic iPod. So I’ve got my cardio people – so it’s anything from Beyonce to some Jay-Z to Janelle Monae, her song ‚Tightrope,‘ that’s a good cardio song. And then I’ve got Sting. I’ve got Mary J. Blige. I’ve got The Beatles. I’ve got Michael Jackson. I try to pick the songs that I personally love.

When people are connected, we can just do some great things. They have the opportunity to get access to jobs, education, health, communications. We have the opportunity to bring the people we care about closer to us. It really makes a big difference.

All Montreal bands have around nine members, I believe.

Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care for people will hear them and be influenced by them for good or ill.

I have feelings too. I am still human. All I want is to be loved, for myself and for my talent.

It confuses me and disappoints me when somebody says, ‚What does he do? What does he do?‘ My records are some of the biggest anthems ever. What do you think, they magically just appear? Obama walked out to my record.

To have in general but little feeling, seems to be the only security against feeling too much on any particular occasion.

I think maybe people see bands and musicians as some sort of superhero unrealistic sport that happens in another dimension where it’s not real people and not real emotions. So, I grew up listening to Beatles records on my floor. That’s how I learned how to play guitar. If it weren’t for them, I wouldn’t be a musician.

Make no mistake about why these babies are here – they are here to replace us.

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.

I think 9/11 affected everybody in one way or another.

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

My music is a luxury.

Hip-hop saved my life, man. It’s the only thing I’ve ever been even decent at. I don’t know how to do anything else.

It’s always great to perform at home in the good ol‘ U.S.A.

Meditation is to be aware of every thought and of every feeling, never to say it is right or wrong, but just to watch it and move with it. In that watching, you begin to understand the whole movement of thought and feeling. And out of this awareness comes silence.

You listen to Charlie Parker or John Coltrane before they found their voice, they sounded different. And when you listen to them after they found their voice on their instruments, they sound more confident and in control. Artists have that, too.

Music, for me, is vital. Punjabi, Bollywood, Sufi, RnB… I listen to it all. When I’m not listening to music, you will find me chatting with friends. Off the field, I just let my instincts take over. I certainly don’t think about batting, or which bowlers I’m going to face.

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 don’t think a song should be put in a category.

People are used to music that justifies street culture but something that’s not touched on is why these kids act the way they act, live the way they live.

Chicago gave me more music than any other city in America.

‚Doo-wop‘ is a very special word for me. Because I grew up listening to my dad who, as a Fifties rock & roll head, loved doo-wop music.

By gnawing through a dike, even a rat may drown a nation.

I taught myself how to play the guitar, I taught myself how to play the drums, and I kind of fake doing both of them. But drumming comes more natural to me, and it just feels better.

I wouldn’t say I have a lack of fear. In fact, I’d like my fear emotion to be less because it’s very distracting and fries my nervous system.

For me, ‚risky‘ is revealing what really happened in my life through music. Risky is writing confessional songs and telling the true story about a person with enough details so everyone knows who that person is.

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.

To all the musicians who are making reggaeton, let’s put some more effort into it and bring something new to the people!

One of my goals from really early on was that if I was ever fortunate enough to be successful in music, I would want to stay the same person and the same songwriter.

The point about melody and beat and lyric is that they exist to engage you in a very particular way. They want to occupy your attention.

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

The most miraculous process is watching a song go from a tiny idea in the middle of the night to something that 55,000 people are singing back to you.

The jazz I love is sweet and pure with raw elements, which is exactly what the good hip-hop is doing now.

Music is this divine thing, the closest that we can get to something divine. It’s like this instinct we all own, and some of us have found a way to hear that music and write it down and share it with people.

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

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

A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.

Effective communication is 20% what you know and 80% how you feel about what you know.

Like any creative human being, I would like a bit more control so that it would be a little easier for me when the director says, ‚One tear, right now,‘ that one tear would pop out.

On a good night, I get underwear, bras, and hotel-room keys thrown onstage… You start to think that you’re Tom Jones.

Who could refrain that had a heart to love and in that heart courage to make love known?