Yolandi Visser Quotes

Putting out my album on my own label has been a great experience for me. It's been very inspiring. It's like a new start for me and having all this creative freedom is so liberating and exciting.

Basically we just created our own label, but again we just did it to document our own music and create our own thing, so the major labels were just always out of our picture, we're not interested.

I always thought that if record companies didn't understand me, fine - I'd go and do it by myself.

I'm pushing ahead on my own - you no longer need a large record company to make you a star.

You don't need a record company to turn you into anything.

It's great to be able to find a way to release your music and do what you want to do artistically and not have to just worry about being accepted by the major label industry.

It's been awesome going indie. I don't need to be on a major label. I love not having to walk into a specific radio person's office to try to convince someone to play my songs. At the end of the day, it's more work, but I've discovered that I like to get my hands dirty.

It's a lot of work being an indie artist, but it's worth it.

Every single thing that I was told that I couldn't do without a label - get in the charts, get on to the Radio 1 playlist - I've done.

I have my own label and I'm my first artist.

I can show bands how to produce themselves. In the same way, many bands think you can't make it without some fat cat in London or New York to manage you. That's just crap. All you need is someone a bit older than you with a bit of business nous whom you trust.

Artists have so much more control of their futures - they don't need to rely so much on major labels or big companies to help them. You have artists like Skrillex that can dominate so much that he gets 5 Grammy nominees, and he's clearly an underground artist.

I made this record without a record label.

I never solicited a major label and I certainly wouldn't now.

We went into that knowing that we were never going to sell a major record 'cause we didn't sound like these bands, so I just thought this was an opportunity for us to make the kind of records that we wanted and make some money at the same time.

I didn't want to be on a major label. I wanted all the attention and the noise to go away because I wanted to be something a little bit more substantial.

When I was working on 'Coloring Book,' I knew that I wanted it to be a beacon for independent artists and music makers with their own agenda.

When you get to a point where you're not beholden to a record company, then it's up to you to say, 'OK, enough knob-turning. We're done.'

I don't have a record deal, I'm not looking for one, I don't have a manager, I'm not promoting anything.

Major labels have always been around our band since the beginning, and we just waited. We knew we had to do some things, and we needed to grow as a band before we made that step. We needed to do it our way and not do it how it works for other people.

People talk about the pop part - they don't talk about me being an independent artist. I made it look easy, that's the problem!

Being an indie artist, you have to fight for position against a major.

Finally I'd found this way where I didn't need a record label; I didn't need to wait for some phone call to tell me, 'Go and do it'. It's like, I'm going to get up with a bag of CDs and an amp and my guitar and make it happen for myself. That was such a liberating feeling, and I think it was the start of everything.

Starting my own label was more out of necessity. I'm not going to sit around and wait for labels to come screaming.

I've always been independent with my music. I've always run my own music label.