First thing, I throw on some jeans, a T-shirt and my Keds sneakers and make coffee. That is actually my favorite time of day. That is when I do my songwriting, when I am in writing mode.
I'm always writing ideas down and then I stick em in my pocket and put em in that folder so I don't lose them. Like, somebody might say something, and I'll go, oh that's a good line, and that goes in the folder, too. It's kind of an ongoing process for me.
You can't be afraid to deal with your demons. You've got to go there to be able to write.
I guess you could write a good song if your heart hadn't been broken, but I don't know of anyone whose heart hasn't been broken.
I've had trouble being in relationships and writing. This has been a real problem for me. I don't know if it's because I'm not free to fantasize or create these fantasy things about other people
I started writing little short stories and poems as soon as I learned to read and write. I think I was six years old. And then when I got to be eleven, twelve, and into my teens, I was just listening to records all the time, and I got a guitar. I started to take guitar lessons when I was twelve.
I can speak for most songwriters - those breakup love songs are so easy to write, as far as the inspiration and all that.
I write the songs, go in and record them, then I listen to everything and decide how it all fits together.
I grew up around poets and novelists and my dad wrote poems about everything - from a cat sleeping in a window to a car wreck he passed on the highway. I learned not to censor myself: that was one of things I learned in my apprenticeship, my creative-writing apprenticeship with my dad.
I started writing more with my voice in mind.
Theres so many other things to write about than unrequited love.
Believe it or not, people went so far as to suggest that I might not be able to write songs anymore because now I am married. I tried to explain again that there are other things to write about besides boy meets girl, girl meets boy, boy breaks up with girl, girl is sad.
I started writing songs, I guess, when I was about 13 or 14, but I didn't know if they were good enough yet or anything.
It's easier to write songs when you're single.
There's this whole idea that you've got the blues and you're going to write. Bullshit. When I feel really bad, all I want to do is sit in front of the TV with the remote control and check out.
I write first for myself as a therapeutic process, to get stuff out and to deal with it.
Sometimes I dream song ideas. I write a song in my dream, the melody and everything. But then sometimes I can't remember them. I think later on, I probably do.
People seemed to think, you get to a certain age or you get married or you, you're comfortable. And so now there's nothing to write about: that angst is gone. The youthful angst. And that just hasn't happened with me.
I usually don't write about my life right when it happens. I process it, and I store it away. Then, when I get in the mood I pull the stuff back out.
There's always stuff to write about. So it's very gratifying on a lot of levels. This is stuff I got asked over and over again, or heard about. People would ask me about it, but they kind of knew the answer. It would be this ongoing question: "Your fans are wondering, now that you're married, are you still going to be able to write songs?" I'm serious! I would get asked that!
I don't keep a journal anymore. I did when I was a teenager, but now because I write about it all in my songs, that's what I'm really doing.
When I started out playing guitar and singing, I was about twelve, going on thirteen. The role models for me back then were the folk singers. They all had these high, really nice voices and ranges, like Judy Collins and Joan Baez, and then later, of course, Joni Mitchell and Linda Ronstadt. I decided early on that I was going to learn how to write songs really, really well, because I didn't want to have to compete as a singer. I didn't feel that it was my strong point.
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