I've always idolized people who can write songs.
There are some songs that don't belong to The Animals that I refuse to give in to and not do. I enjoy singing other people's songs, you know. That's why they're written in the first place.
Personal relationships are usually my biggest inspirations for writing my songs. The best way for me to write a song is to visualise the story in my head, and I start humming a melody, and before you know it, a song is born.
The past is filled with people who aren't traditionally thought of as fantastic singers singing these songs that capture people; songs like 'Louie Louie.' I just aim toward that, and I think I've gotten better at it.
Sometimes, we've made songs where we're angry and yelling, and then there are some songs where we're just having fun and dancing and happy.
I had so much fun playing songs from 'Based On A True Story...' and getting to see the crowd's reaction to those songs was unforgettable.
I wrote 'Happy Man' with a couple of boys of mine. I have been writing in Nashville for a long time. Of course I was writing songs back in Oklahoma when I was a kid.
Female influence came from my grandmother and my aunt. They would sing Corsican love songs while cleaning the house and dress all in black and say melodramatic things like: 'I want to die.'
I think with musicals, it's much more part of the script. They don't want songs that would stop the show; they need songs that keep the plot moving.
I have songs about growing up, about ex-relationships - ex-relationship, I should say.
Most of my songs start out as being very aggressive and guitar-driven.
Whenever I sing 'Total Eclipse of the Heart,' the way people sing along with me still excites me. It's one of the songs that audiences know all the lyrics to, and they sing along with me, and it makes me so happy. People also know my songs 'Holding out for a Hero' and 'Lost in France,' and this gives me so much joy on stage.
I write songs about love because, above all, love is the most human thing we have together. Feelings are a part of us every day. You feel things every day, no matter where you are. So that's what I write about.
I've always been a fan of just writing songs and making music.
I don't choose the songs; the songs choose me.
I decided at 15 that I didn't want to be one of those artists that gets up and sings love songs they don't mean. I decided that I was going to be me to the fullest extent, that my songs were going to reflect relationships I've had, things I've been through, and even the stuff I'm embarrassed about.
I think people can just make things now. It's kind of what happened with the music industry. Before, a band couldn't afford to go into a nice studio, or if they were going to go into a nice studio, they had to record twenty-five songs in two days. That's not a healthy workflow for anyone.
My music is a personal thing, and I feel like if I talk too much about the songs, or if there's too much of my personal life out there, it ruins it.
The songs, if I write alone in a room, end up being a little more quiet, a little more subdued. If I play with other musicians or percussive instruments, it might end up being a little more upbeat.
I have a repertoire of songs that I'm proud of, that I've written for my own band. When I do a cover, something that somebody else has written, I think about it very carefully before I sing that song. I have to really get behind it and understand it and like it. And that's how I pick roles. I don't want to play just anything.
I don't want to sing songs that aren't worth while. Time is so rare. I just don't want to waste the listener's time and I think that my songs don't do that. That's what I pray for. I want songs that really touch people's hearts.
I love deeply, and when it comes to singing love songs and something that I have no problem doing, I put all of my heart and soul into these love songs. I know my fans out there are listening, taking these songs to heart. Like I say, they're relating these songs to their lives, too, and their relationships.
I love a lot of Irish folk music and Irish folk songs.
I was one of those goofy kids whose year narrowed down to focus on Christmas from about September on. I guess I was like Ralphie in 'A Christmas Story,' in that I would get swept up into the anticipation of the holiday, watching the lights go up, hearing the songs in the stores, getting special Christmas issues of comics and all that.
I guess, for me, the therapy is walking on stage, playing all of our songs, and walking out. That's probably my therapy. That's a good time.
In Mudcrutch we all wrote songs, and when it got to the focus on Tom and the Heartbreakers, I kept writing songs, but it wasn't anything that was up the Heartbreakers tree, I didn't think - and I don't think they did, either. So I kept writing songs for the hell of it, but I didn't want to make a record just for the sake of making a record.
We sing songs about love because we love the people we sing our songs to!
Sometimes it might seem like I'm using my songs to give other people pointers. But mainly, they're for me, just little notes to myself that I collected, and the wisdom that I've read. I give myself a lot of advice.
A lot of times, when you're the leading lady, you get to sing heartwarming songs and that's it, and people don't get a sense of who you truly are.
I want to sell music, and I want radio to play my songs.
I don't think that there's much that sets me apart from other musicians, but I think there are definitely things that set me apart from other kinds of artists. I feel that musicians do it their own way, write their own songs and put on a great live shows.
I continually blacken pages and scribble away, so I always have a number of songs that are half-finished.
It's hard to write new stuff when the songs you have written before are still changing and evolving. It would be like building something when the foundations there are not really solid.
I wrote my first song at 6. I spent every day with the guitar, and I just made up songs.
I do all the classics, like Dylan, Kristofferson, Jimmy Reed, Mexican mariachi songs, some jazz songs from the '30s. Cole Porter's 'Begin the Beguine,' that's one of my favorites.
I'm not a morose person; it's just that my best songs reflect on the sadder aspects of life.
