I'm dead serious about my craft and just really serious about making music in itself. I take pride in making songs and albums where no two songs sound alike. That's the challenge and that's what it's all about, to keep it original and fresh and funky.
I like to keep morale up and not take things so seriously all the time. I enjoy life and laughs but I'm serious about the music. Serious about the craft of songwriting.
There will be slow songs, sad songs, happy songs, songs about boys, and songs about being who you are. I'm making sure I'm happy with all of the songs, because if I am not happy with them, I can't expect anyone else to be, you know?
We need to get serious about defeating ISIS; we just aren't serious about it yet. I would be very serious about getting it done. I know how to do it. We need to take the fight to them on the battlefield in a more serious way.
I think of myself more as an actress. I do my music because I'm very passionate about my music. I love making music. I love inspiring people. I love making great songs that are just really fun. But that's all it usually is for me. I love touring and singing great songs. I don't think I'll ever win a Grammy one day, and I'm totally fine with that. I do work really hard when it comes to acting and I want to do that for a long time.
There are no limitations with a song. To me a song is a little piece of art. It can be whatever you like it to be. You can write the simplest song, and that's lovely, or you can just write a song that is abstract art. ... A lot of my songs are very serious, I'm like dead serious about certain things and I feel that I'm writing about the world, through my own eyes. ... I have a love for simple basic song structure, although sometimes you'd never know it. ... Most of the songs I wrote at night. I would just wake in the middle of the night. That's when I found the space to write.
Most of the time, the songs have jokes in them, little sarcastic things, or purposely kitsch or something. So that's going along with a story, like I do in life, just talking to myself and making fun of stuff and laughing at stuff that's serious. And sometimes it's a good idea to put the laughing into the songs. Sometimes it's not. Sometimes it's all right just to be serious. But most of the songs have some kind of joke in them.
I didn't really feel any pressure when I've made records, I haven't as yet anyway. I feel when I'm making a record that I'm so excited about making new songs that when I'm doing demos of new songs, as soon as I make one that's really different I get really excited about the record, I don't care about the last record anymore.
I can't imagine ever not making music, making albums, writing songs, doing shows. That's all I really know, and that's all I really do.
I just always wrote songs as a side hobby. So it was sort of a natural thing to write comedy songs. But when I started writing songs, I wrote very serious songs. Or things that a 13-14 year-old would think are very serious issues.
Being in a rock band is about touring. It's about writing songs and it's about making records but it's also about taking a wonderful smile onto that stage and making the people feel good about themselves.
I was always into pop music, Destiny's Child, songs with catchy music. Even when I was writing when I was younger, it wasn't all about expressing myself; it was just about making fun music.
Making a record? You've got to have the song, then you create a record. I think it's the same with a live performance. If the material is strong, you're already 90% there. I always tell young people it's all about the music, the songs. Work on the songs, work on the songs, work on the songs.
It's always been about the songs for us. It doesn't matter about all the image stuff. We're really about making songs that people can relate to, that we love, that they will love, that we will enjoy playing live.
I want to make music and songs about things that real musicians and artist aren't able to make songs about - you wouldn't hear Justin Bieber making a song about homework, or, like, you wouldn't see someone make a song with their parents on the track.
The fun image is what we project onstage, because our music is dance music. But it's not what the group is about We're very serious about our music and the band and producing good quality songs.
The hard part about writing about a guy like John Brown is that he was so serious, and his cause was so serious, that most of what's been written about him is really serious and, in my opinion, a little bit boring.