Oh every time I close my eyes I see my name in shining lights
There's always a bittersweet kind of thing, but I feel like everything had to work out the way it is. Everything that had to happen, happened.
I think I don't take myself too seriously. You know as far as, it's a fun life. I take my music serious, but I like to have fun.
I just write songs that I strongly believe in and that are coming from inside. There's no tricks. It's honesty with big melodies.
Every artist should want to be like Michael Jackson
I don't like two stories. I like one story. I never grew up with stairs. I like to stick to what I know.
You pick up some fans and a handful of haters along the way.
It's probably the worst feeling in the world, when you're deeply and madly in love with a woman and you know she's not feeling you the same way, and you don't know why.
I write a lot of songs about being in love, how beautiful women are but I've definitely experienced that other side of love where you're in a situation where you love a girl so much but you just know for a fact that she doesn't love you the same. "Grenade" is the extreme way of saying "I'd do anything for you and why can't I feel you would do the same for me?
What I like about Elvis is the same thing I like about James Brown, Michael Jackson, Prince. These guys, back in the day, there was no smoke and mirrors. It was just raw talent. They would step out onstage and command an audience.
I definitely don't plead guilty to being a heartthrob.
I think everybody don't know what color I am. It's like, "He's not black enough. He's not white enough. He's got a Latin last name but he doesn't have - he doesn't speak Spanish. Who are we selling this to? Are you making urban music? Are you making pop music? What kind of music are you making?"
I don't try and be dark, but there are obviously darker emotions that I want to capture sometimes.
I've had big record label presidents look me in the face and say, 'Your music sucks, you don't know who you are, your music is all over the place, and we don't know how to market this stuff. Pick a lane and come back to us.'
Becoming famous was never what I wanted to do. There's a lot of things that come with fame - it's what people in the limelight have to do.
I feel like you have to constantly keep proving yourself, and you have to constantly keep getting out there and showing them you're more than just that one song on the radio that's just playing. And that's what I had to do the first time around; I had to keep going out there and keep performing live.
Today, I'd like to talk to Bob Marley. I'd just like to ask him what was his method. Bob is one of the greatest songwriters ever. I don't know if people understand how powerful his songs are and the simplicity and genius behind them, from 'Redemption Song' to 'Is This Love?' and 'I Shot the Sheriff.'
The drumming helps a lot when I'm producing songs or writing songs. My knowledge of drums helps more in that aspect, (although) I don't know, man; I'm not great at any of them.
I could sing you a thousand and one doo-wop songs. I love the simplicity in that music. It's not super-poetic, it's just from the heart.
Jimi Hendrix is the greatest guitar player in the world... a guy who mastered that instrument. It was talking when he played. And when he did a solo, he made the guitar cry - or made it sound like it was coming from the devil's amplifier.
It's dedicating yourself to your craft. Spending thousands of hours in a studio learning how to write a song, learning how to play different chords, training yourself to sing. You know, to get better and better.
Ever since I was a kid, this was all I wanted to do. I've wanted to do music. I wanted to sing. It's all I know.
I feel, as a songwriter, it's one of the hardest things to do - to sit down and say how you feel.
I feel it's my job to continue being a student of music if I want to continue being an artist and a producer of other artists. You have to keep filling your mind with other music. You have to be ahead of the curve.
We all grew up idolizing another musician. That's how this works. That's how music is created.
