Big labels can buy you radio play, they can buy you social media likes and YouTube views. I don't have any of that, but I'm still getting a Top 3 album and Top 20 singles.
You look at some of the top teams in the world that have got the best strikers, and they are looking to buy another top striker. But if you have got a top goalkeeper, you are not often looking to buy another goalkeeper.
I'd love to do well on a big weekend with people watching and cheering, of course. But it's not fair to create an expectation level before I know what is realistic. I want to finish as well as possible. Is that top 20? Top 15? Top 25? You just have to play it by ear.
You will see nowadays TV's Top 20 and Radio's Top 20 tend to be the same. And then there are films that never reach to mass audience, and because of that, their soundtrack also dies a silent death.
I never used to get calls from artists or labels, but once you have a top 20 hit, you start getting them.
I got out while they were still fighting to buy tickets to hear me. I believe in getting out when you're on top, and that's what I did.
You could be Top 5 on iTunes, but for people to buy an album, they've got to have a connection with an artist. Every time I bought someone's album, it was about the connection. I was loving everything, from their raps to their style. I wanted to meet them.
I do a lot of curiosity buying; I buy it if I like the album cover, I buy it if I like the name of the band, anything that sparks my imagination. I still like to go to record stores, I like to just wander around and I'll buy whatever catches my attention.
If you play for Barcelona or Ajax or for any top team or top side, they want to see the top players excel every week.
I do not buy CDs any more; I usually stream Internet radio. For movies, I hardly every buy any DVDS. I have a DVR, so just record things off HBO, Showtime and so on.
I'm still a big wrestling fan. I buy the Pay-Per-Views. I think that gives me the right to speak out just like any other fan.
We've been trained to spend money since we were born with all these commercials with toys and G.I. Joes and Transformers. But there's so many things in the supermarket, there's so many things on television that automatically, when you turn it on, are saying, 'Buy! Buy! Buy! Buy! Buy! Buy! Buy!'
I've always invested in myself, whether it was marketing or putting an album together and paying for radio. Spending eight months to a year working on one single to try to get it where you know it's a hit and you can take it into the top 20.
My kids don't really buy albums. They buy singles.
For the players, these top, top, top games or these top, top, top events - like a World Cup or a European Championship - are not common but, of course, something special.
From Nike, we buy victory. From Under Armour, we buy protection. From Lululemon, we buy zen. From Patagonia, we buy conservation. From BMW, we buy performance.
We know that if you have $20 million, it's better to buy a van Gough print than it is buy an executive jet, from the point of view of the environment. But when you start getting down, it's like the recycling question: What are things we can really afford to do, and how much pleasure do we get out of them? We haven't even started to have that discussion, and it's getting awfully late.