A Quote by Sinead O'Connor

Songs are like ropes that you can kind of hang on to or pull yourself up on. — © Sinead O'Connor
Songs are like ropes that you can kind of hang on to or pull yourself up on.
I don't want to hear songs about how sunshiny things are. I don't like songs that feel like radio candy... I like the ones that make you think, laugh or cry - they pull some kind of emotion out of you.
I don't want to hear songs about how sunshiny things are. I don't like songs that feel like radio candy I like the ones that make you think, laugh or cry - they pull some kind of emotion out of you.
I was being musically mentored by a lot of people who were obviously more talented and skilled than I was, and I thought that I would just kind of learn the ropes of songwriting there - like how to do acoustic, country-esque songs, which I like because there's so much story in them.
When I pull into a city and I rent a car and it's Nashville, or it's London, or I'm driving in the taxi to the hotel, and on comes one of my songs, it's like, 'Oh my God, they're still playing these songs on the radio.' And you still feel tearful and very grateful that somebody still likes these songs that you made up.
Ah, we men and women are like ropes drawn tight with strain that pull us in different directions.
I'm not the kind of writer that can wake up and say, "Okay, I'm gonna write a song today," and have that song be the kind I would want to record. The songs of mine that I end up liking are songs that come from real experience. They're like chapter titles in my life.
I've always loved the songs of the sea. I was first introduced to them back in 1957, at the Old Town School of Folk Music. I used to go to Pete Seeger concerts, and he would do songs like 'Ruben Ranzo' and talk about how the sailors sang songs to do their work - to raise the anchors, pull up the sails and that sort of thing.
I was surfing the Internet, and I came across a school in Atlanta where you could learn how to climb trees with ropes the way the pros do. It sounded terrific, and so I went down there, and I began to learn these kind of rarified techniques for how you get up and down trees while using special ropes and gear.
Some of Eminem's rap songs kind of have the teenage love songs like the fifties love songs. It's kind of like domestic drama set to music. He is really good storyteller.
I feel like for me to write songs that I would be interested in as a listener, there has to be tension, and there has to be some kind of push and pull between reality and the potential of disaster.
You know, when you're making a record, you come up with 15, 20 songs. Then they start to fall by the wayside as your interest wanes. It's kind of like a process of elimination to determine which songs wind up on the record.
I always work on the songs all together up until the very end. I never mix a song and think, "Okay, now that one's done." I think that's why it feels like songs are really connected, and I like that. They're all worked on kind of like a little family.
All my songs usually borrow from my own life but pull from fantasy or other people's stories that you hear, or something you read. It's fun as a writer to pull from all those different places, and to connect them. But also, I don't have an interesting enough life to strictly pull from that.
I thought it would be cool to Skype with fans on their birthday and spend, like, a half-hour with them. I did a couple of two-hour Skypes. I just hang out with them and play songs and stuff. At first they're kind of shy, but after a while they open up. I've had a lot of people tell me I'm doing something no one has ever done before.
Then, you know, the other more-traditional role of the producer in, like, the kind of Quincy Jones sense is kind of part arranger. So you're coming up with, like, these - you hear these songs that are quite bare-bones, and you dream up what's the band doing? What's the rhythm section doing? What's the guitars, strings, pianos - that sort of thing. It's almost like a little toolbox.
I hope no one asks me to show them the ropes; I have no idea where they are. Maybe I could pull some strings and find out.
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