Explore Quotes on Song

I recorded my first song at 15. But I started rhyming a few years before that. At first it was trading lyrics at school. We'd get in a circle in the playground with a beat-boxer and spit rhymes. Then it would turn into a big gathering after school.

My first impression when I heard 'Heaven' was, 'Do not let anyone else have that song! I'm putting it on hold.' I knew it was special from the first time I heard it, and I thought my fans would love it as much as I did.

When I'm making a song, I try not to think about audience or genres. It's free-flowing. Natural.

I love a good old-school reggaeton song.

The song 'Leroy and Lanisha' on my album 'The Epic' is really my homage to 'Linus and Lucy.'

Recording a song for a film doesn't take much time; it's hardly an hour's job, but concerts are constant, and so is travelling, so I've to take time out to work on my albums because I'm passionate about creating my own music. When you love something dearly, you set your priorities accordingly.

When I was 12, I introduced my mom to Def Leppard's 'Pour Some Sugar on Me.' I told her it was an amazing song, and I remember her not really agreeing with me.

Too many people focus on writing what they think they should write, what should be in a song, what radio would want.

I love words. They're fun. I don't think any word can just be filler. There's no room for it. It's like a puzzle. Every song can be written a million times. How can you say it differently?

What I'm doing is basically the same as Bob Dylan did with folk songs and Woody Guthrie songs, the same as folk music's always done. I'm not going to sing about ploughing, but I'll write a song that sounds like it should be about ploughing.

As a songwriter you have an umbilical cord to the song and it's hard to expand on your understanding of the lyrics. Whereas when you cover a song you can create your own reason why you're attached to it.

There's a few times in the past when I wrote a song, and I put the words together, and they were very clear pictures, and I felt like I was putting together a really good story. But I don't think I was ever really able to stay on that. What I've sort of developed lyrically is more about the sound of the vocals and what they are.

If a song I'm lucky enough to be a part of comes on the radio, it's definitely really cool and exciting, but I can't focus on anything but the song. Same if one of my songs comes on in a restaurant. I can't just carry on a conversation.

The thing is, if you tell your story specifically enough, it becomes so universal. Just because you're a gay man singing an honest love song, people should know that it's about men and that they can still relate to it.

I want to make sure in every song we write that women are given power.

I'm a big Beethoven fan, and you'll struggle to find a three-minute song on any of his stuff.

We don't ever write stuff individually and say, 'OK, this is gonna be the song.' We bring in ideas in their rawest form and bounce them around to find the thing that is bigger than any individual's idea.

I would love to do a song with Janet Jackson. Janet was, is, forever will be, the ultimate. She's the ultimate dream girl for every guy - and for every girl.

I think there'll always be a kid with a guitar with a song in his heart that's going to turn me on - that's as far as I can see. Whether lots of people agree with that, I'm not sure.

I've never made a bad song.

My go to karaoke song is 'Stars' from 'Les Mis', which is Javert's song. And it's super strange, and every time it comes on people are really weirded out, but that's what I do.