I’m a songwriter and I’d love to make that a part of my career.
I’m more of an artist and a songwriter than I am a DJ. That word seems a little bit – well, it doesn’t really describe what I do.
I made numerous attempts to find a way to do it all, to be a creative singer, songwriter, producer, and to be the mother, daughter, sister, lover, wife. And the thing about music is, with me, that she’s a harsh mistress. She does not come to me in the midst of stress.
As part of Depeche Mode, I don’t think it’s right for me to be using my own songs for a solo project. I’m not a very prolific songwriter, so I keep those for Depeche Mode.
It’s every songwriter’s dream to come up with a standard.
No, my son’s a songwriter and he does that.
I’m not particularly good at anything. I’m not an incredible guitarist or piano player or songwriter. I think what I do is, when I notice someone is really good at something, I try to get that out of them.
My third hire when I came to Spotify was Tiffany Kumar, who came on as our global head of songwriter relations. The whole idea was to put our heads together and figure out how to build and contribute within the songwriting community.
If you don’t know Tom Lehrer, you should – in addition to being a classical pianist, mathematician, songwriter, satirist, researcher at Los Alamos and, he claims, inventor of the Jell-O shot, he is just delightfully funny and graceful.
As a songwriter and as a vocalist, Adele is amazing. You have that. But then there’s something about her that’s just very honest. I feel like so many people across the board can relate to her and who she is. She’s just so appealing and very real.
When I got signed as a songwriter, I immediately thought, ‘Oh, no one sees me as an artist because I don’t look good enough.’ So I shut down the whole idea.
You need to understand that a skilled professional songwriter can accelerate your success as an already talented musician. These people are writing every single day, so their craft is really sharp, and it’s the best songwriters who consistently get on the radio.
When you’re a songwriter and you click with someone, you tend to want to keep writing with that person.
I grew up playing guitar and writing music, and I always wanted to be a songwriter and a singer and play the guitar. But while I was finishing college, my drag became lucrative, so I had to pursue what was going to pay the bills – and doing comedy as Trixie was something that I was able to market.
I started listening to The-Dream a lot. That’s when I really got into writing songs. I like the way he put lyrics and makes his songs. So I was like, ‘All right,’ and I just started writing. That’s when I started wanting to be a songwriter.
I’ve been a musician and a songwriter for years, since I was a teenager, and made my living doing that on and off for a long time, so when it came to writing comedy material, it was the thing that came easiest to me, the most natural way of writing.
I didn’t want to be this four-chord acoustic singer songwriter because that stuff just got so old to me.
There’s no one songwriter in the band. It’s collaborative, and we all have different tastes.
I’m a songwriter. Everything affects me.
Jimmy Van Heusen was a top security test pilot in World War II as well as being a great songwriter. He was absolutely incredible. Van Heusen inspired me to write music.
Look, nobody is a bigger fan of Tommy Shaw than me. The day I met him in 1975 I knew he was going to be a great guitar player, performer and songwriter. I was his biggest fan, and I’m Styx’s number one fan.
If you aren’t already a songwriter, try it. When you can say what you want to say, in your own words, it’s incredibly easy to show an audience who you are.
David Bowie worked with Brian Eno and dressed up in extraordinary clothes, but he was also a brilliant songwriter who captured the thoughts of a generation. He was hugely successful, without compromise.
As a songwriter, if you can touch people and make them feel a little less alone in the world, then you’ve done your job.
‘In Case You Didn’t Know’ was written in Mexico, actually, on a songwriter’s retreat.
I never dreamed of being a singer or songwriter. It just happened.
John Martyn is my biggest hero. My mom got me into his music when I was a kid. I’ve looked up to him more than anyone as a songwriter. And Bert Jansch is one of the pillars of acoustic music, the holy grail.
I think overall, and this isn’t specific to Spotify or any streaming service or any label… when you consider the overall value chain of the music industry and how important the songwriter is to the business – I think there needs to be another look at the value chain.
You probably shouldn’t date a songwriter if you don’t want to end up on the record.
Someone had an eye on me as I was leaving high school. I had a chance to record demos, but they were kind of wanting to make a pop singer out of me, of the ‘X Factor’ variety. I didn’t feel comfortable with it. I wanted to be a songwriter.
As a songwriter, you always look for guys that you can write good with. Show up, have an idea, knock it out of the park.
As writers, you spend so long trying to build your cred as a writer, and then everything comes together at the same time: your artist career happens when your songwriter career is, too.
The first thing Fontana did was get me to change my hair colour from light brown to red, and the songwriter Mitch Murray suggested I change my name from Pauline Matthews to Kiki Dee.
I don’t think people really understood what I did. And you know, in my book, ‘A Helluva High Note’ deals with my back story, that I was a songwriter, that I spent years trying to hone my craft and being rejected and then finally becoming a successful songwriter, record executive and publisher.
You kind of have to have no ego to be a producer and a songwriter.
I consider myself to be an inept pianist, a bad singer, and a merely competent songwriter. What I do, in my opinion, is by no means extraordinary.
I traveled the world as a DJ, as a singer, as a songwriter, as a producer.
Everybody in L.A. is a songwriter, producer, actor, creative. For some reason, you’re supposed to go to a bar and all hang out and act like you like each other. There is a lot of fake stuff that goes on.
When I became a songwriter, it was out of some sort of desperation. I needed to create something. I had to latch on to something, and the guitar was what I grabbed.
I feel I want to grow as an actress and be better. I want to progress as a singer and songwriter, and produce movies and everything. So there’ll be no time when I feel I’ve done it all.
I grew up with this idea that songwriters had a great job. My family was Irish Catholic, so if you became a priest or a songwriter, you were golden.
My goal as a songwriter now is to simply write some memorable turns of phrase.
I don’t really like to call myself a brand, and I don’t like to think of myself as a brand. I’m a singer, a songwriter, a musician and a performer. And an actress, and all the other things that I do. When you add it all together, some might call it a brand, but that’s not my focus.
The hack songwriter will write the absolute truth every single word, whether it makes a great song or not.
L.A.’s cool; I had a run with it to where it just pretty much wore me out. I love the weather and I have great friends there, great family, but I really cannot take a lot of the culture. Like Nashville, where everybody’s a songwriter, everybody out there is an actor.
‘Aqualung’ marks the point at which I had the confidence as a songwriter and as a guitar player to actually pick up and play the guitar and be at the forefront of the band. It’s also the album on which I began to address religious issues in my music, and I think that happened simply because the time was right for it.
Bowie is probably my favorite all-around songwriter and performer and personality. His ability to change over the years is such an inspiration. I love ‘Young Americans’ and ‘Fame.’
I really want people to know I’m a songwriter.
The cool thing about being a songwriter, or a writer, I guess, in general, you can take on a lot of different things, experience a lot of different things, just by writing about them.
Not being a natural songwriter… for me the appreciation of a great song and the writers came early on, growing up in a musical family. My dad got to sing songs by some of the greatest writers of all time, Rodgers and Hammerstein.
I think Alison Krauss is one of the most amazing singers ever. As a songwriter – this is gonna sound cheesy – I love Randy Newman. And my mom passed on a love of Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell. At one point I was so into the Indigo Girls, just like I was so into the Dixie Chicks, those female harmonies.
I am neither such a great songwriter or such a great singer that the world must hear my album. There’s just no point to make.
I want to say at once that I frankly believe that Irving Berlin is the greatest songwriter that has ever lived…. His songs are exquisite cameos of perfection, and each one of them is as beautiful as its neighbor. Irving Berlin remains, I think, America’s Schubert.
I’d love to claim the title of ‘songwriter’ or ‘intellectual,’ but the truth is that anything that I ever learned how to do in conjunction with music was purely so that I would have a platform to sing from.
