A Quote by Amanda Palmer

There’s no “correct path” to becoming a real artist. You might think you’ll gain legitimacy by going to university, getting published, getting signed to a record label. But it’s all bullshit, and it’s all in your head. You’re an artist when you say you are. And you’re a good artist when you make somebody else experience or feel something deep or unexpected.
I think that fame only goes to your head if you are not a real artist. If you are a real artist and a good person who loves what they are doing, you are going to be the same person.
Every project might only sell like 30 to 50,000, but I mean, I'm getting seven, eight dollars every CD. I make more money per record than an artist on a major label - I can definitely say that.
You are an artist when you make someone feel something deep and unexpected.
Commercial success still hasn't come to an artist that isn't signed to a record label. There are very few artists that can succeed without the help of a record label. The role of the record label is still required, it's still necessary.
What made me want to become a recording artist; I was the first artist that was repeatedly asked by a label to record with them. That label was Def Jam Records.
Every time I'm in the studio, I always think of my professor in undergrad. He was like, "There are so many artists in the world. If you're going to be an artist, make sure you have something to say. Don't just be an artist and put out bullshit. Have something to say." I guess that would be my philosophy and something I think about all the time. Every day when I'm in the studio I hear him and I see him. I remember him saying it in class. So that's something that I always want to make sure I have: I'm saying something with the work.
Being an artist doesn't just mean you have a song. That doesn't make you an artist. The word 'artist' means so many different things, and I feel like to be a real one, you really have to do it all. The people that I think of as artists - Tyler the Creator, Childish Gambino, Kanye West - are doing the most.
For me, I wanted somebody that got me musically, that understood that I'm an artist and this is who I am. I'm not going to be like another artist on your label, probably - hopefully. I found all those things with the Broken Bow group.
I don't think you have to earn your income as an artist to be an artist. But if you are an artist, then art is what you do, whether or not you're paid for doing it; it is what you do, not what you are. I regard artist not as a description of temperament but as a category of profession, of vocation.
When I first started out in the music industry and went to Elektra Records, I didn't go to be an artist, I went to get a record label started. And they said in order to have a label deal, I had to be an artist - so that's what I did.
I hate it when people say, I'm an artist. I think, well, I'll be the judge of that. And I don't think artist is a job description. It's a critique, a favorable critique, that someone else might apply to your work. I guess in the art world I'm not exactly a photographer, but I do use photography.
If you are the record label who owns Lady Gaga, and you have a new artist coming up, you can say, 'Let's have the artist play just before Gaga.' Now you've exposed the huge Gaga audience to the new artist. It's similar to showing a trailer before a movie. The hit creates a hit.
Judging your early artistic efforts is artist abuse. . . Remember that in order to recover as an artist, you must be willing to be a bad artist. Give yourself permission to be a beginner. By being willing to be a bad artist, you have a chance to be an artist, and perhaps, over time, a very good one
As I have continued to make music and progress as an artist, I think I am steadily getting better at expanding my lyrical content and defining who I am as an artist.
They told me that they are starting a classic label, and wanted me to be the first artist. So I signed, and am producing myself, and writing my own music, but I'm their first artist on their classic label. And I have creative control.
Being an artist doesn't mean that you're a good artist. That was the bargain I first made with myself: I'd say, I'm an artist, but I'm not really very good.
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