When I produce someone's record I have to remember it's their record..no matter what I bring to it..er, sometimes that's not too easy:) It is a responsibility made less easy by people I work with encouraging me to play guitar on their record...A soon as I start playing guitar on someone's record it inevitably starts to sound like me...not always a good thing.
Most of these producers have an agenda of what they want to push or what they think will be hot for someone. I don't have an agenda. My agenda is to take someone and bring out their dreams, what they're hearing in their head.'
If you have no agenda of your own, life will work according to its agenda. Your personal agenda is taking you further and further away from that.
The mainstream media has its own agenda. They do not want to print the facts. They have an agenda, they have a slant, they have a bias. It is outrageous to me.
I don't know if I ever feel totally great about a record when I put it out. With every record that I put out, someone has literally got to come pry it from me because when I listen to my own music, I just hear flaws in it.
Whenever I release a record, it's my record. It's not a selfish thought. I may work all year 'round for other people. So, finally, when I come out with my own album, it should be me with the creative help of other musicians.
When I work on someone else's record, I'm happy to alter the way I approach it, if I happen to like who they are and I'm interested in their music. But I know it's their record.
At 13 years old, I realized I could start my own band. I could write my own song, I could record my own record. I could start my own label. I could release my own record. I could book my own shows. I could write and publish my own fanzine. I could silk-screen my own T-shirt. I could do this all myself.
When I'm making my own record, it's real work for me.
In the beginning, somebody told me there was a record in the cruiserweight division where Evander Holyfield became the champion. I thought about that, and I told my team, 'Let's make our own history, our own record, to beat Holyfield's record.'
I've never had a relationship with a record executive. I always went to the record company by someone that liked my playing. Then they would get fired, and I'd be left with the record company. And then - because they got fired - the record company wouldn't do anything for me.
Once you start saying, 'Let's talk political, my own politics, my own aspirations,' it can become not just distracting in that it takes time, but it can become confusing and frustrating, and is this now a political agenda or a governmental agenda.
It's funny - some producers ask me, 'Man, how do you work on a Bieber record? That would kill my career.' I can work on any record there is as long as they are good records and you're pushing things forward.
My own agenda is going to be followed, and that agenda is to maintain very good relations with the international community, and Lebanon has to fulfill its commitments.
Someone who surprises me, someone who makes me laugh, and someone who has her own life and wants to share that with me. I hate those relationships where someone is just following the other person around, you know?
The Body thinks it has an agenda that is important. And the Mind imagines that its agenda is vital to your survival. But the older you get the more you realize that it is the Soul's agenda, and only the Soul's agenda, that matters.