The snappier lyrics come when I'm feeling really good and up. A lot of times, they come after I've just had a meeting with somebody that was uplifting, and you get home, and you're feeling playful or upbeat or whatever, and then they just seem to pop right out.
I grew up Catholic, so I have these defenses about listening to anything with too much religiosity; some of the lyrics didn't sit well in my mouth. One of my beefs is the patriarchal setup. Having the 'he, he, he, God, God, God, king, king, king' stuff was hard for me.
When I first started making music, I was all about wordplay and how fast I could rap, but over the years, I've really gained an appreciation for melody. What's cool is that when you're singing, you have to be concise, and when you're rapping, you have the opportunity to be really detailed with your lyrics.
I do believe that when I'm writing music, I get addicted to the music of the concept of what the outcome of the song is, or the passion behind the lyrics.
I missed being onstage behind the microphone. After a while, it was hard to hear another voice singing my lyrics.
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.
When I was 3 or 4, I seemed to be bursting with music. They played Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, Frank Sinatra in the house, so I learned my vocabulary from song lyrics - I was literally singing before I was talking.
Sometimes I'll have an idea for a story or have a subject, and that will inspire lyrics, but most of the time, hopefully, they already exist somewhere else.
I'm always writing something. There's always some structure sitting around someplace. There's always things on the computer, things scratched on score paper, legal tablets full of lyrics. It's never not buzzing around me all the time. I'm always doing it.
I'm not proud of the lyrics to 'Shake It Up.'
Inspiration comes from everywhere. Obviously, my lyrics are what I most care about in the moment and what I feel like I need to say.
To write lyrics and sing stuff used to be a real chore for me, especially before this 'Diamond Eyes' record. I was spending years making records.
Typically I go in the studio and whatever I'm contemplating that day will wind up being a song. I don't come in with lyrics... I just go in and let it happen.
Playing the guitar, you kind of lock into a rhythm and a groove, and then it relaxes me to make up lyrics and sing.
I never find myself even catching lyrics until something in the sound has taken me captive. Thinking about anything else is just the pleasurable byproduct of wow.
When I was 15 or 16 playing in groups, we used to sit in the car and try to write the lyrics down as a song was playing, and we'd assign each person a verse, you know: 'I'm going to do the first one. You go for the second one.' And then sometimes you'd wait an hour for it to come on again so you could finish it up.
I have to have a guitar sitting around. I sing in the shower. I sing around the house. The music comes secondary. The lyrics come first.
I never wrote music or arranged songs or lyrics when I was under the influence of anything but coffee. That's not gone away.
No matter what I do, my songs come out in a certain style, and if that sounds like Dead Kennedys, then there's probably a reason for it. Don't forget, I wrote most of those songs, music and lyrics.
Soul lyrics, soul music came at about the same time as the civil rights movement, and it's very possible that one influenced the other.
I always had a passion for writing, but I always visualized other artist singing my lyrics, I never visualized myself.
I get writer's block all the time. The only way I can write what I consider to be good lyrics is to put myself through the mill.
In writing lyrics - well, for me, anyway - it's about getting into character, you know? 'Who is writing this?' In the case of the original 'Thick As A Brick,' supposedly a precocious, very young child who's fantasizing about his future and the context of all the confusing elements to which school boys are subjected at that time.
I'm a big fan of lyrics - lyrics are the thing that move me in certain ways.
I'm a great believer in letting lyrics just flow out, wherever they come from.
Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen. They're my biggest heroes. I love everything about Leonard Cohen: his lyrics and his voice. He seems like a really clever man, and Bob Dylan does as well. He's just really cool.
I first write melodies that will make people shiver, and then, I add the lyrics.
Writing is a very intimate thing, especially when you write lyrics and sing them in front of someone for the first time. It's like a really embarrassing situation. To me, singing is almost like crying, and you have to really know someone before you can start crying in front of them.
Lyrics are so important, I hate every second of writing them, but it's something I take great pride in when it's finished.
I don't really plan what comes out of my mouth, and that's what makes most of my lyrics entertaining.
I've always felt that some of my best lyrics are less than three minutes long, and it's great when you can do that - be succinct and get the message across in a simple, clear idea.
I filled the margins of my schoolbooks with lyrics.
I'm probably tougher on myself than I used to be. I'll revise my lyrics more. Part of that is working with the right people and producers who will say, 'How can you make that better?' Allowing yourself to collaborate with people will push you toward transcendence.
If you want to relate me to the newer cats, let's go. Let's go line for line and bar for bar. If it's all about spitting and metaphors and MCing and lyrics and entendres, I will eat 99 percent of you dudes up.
I've always been a fan of country music. It's America's music - I love the songs, love the lyrics.
I sing 'All Apologies' with my own lyrics. People want to sing along, but then, oops, they realize it's a different story.