Brian Setzer Quotes

I was never much of a singer. I was terrible. It's embarrassing: I was trying to sound like everybody else. I went through a big Cure phase, so I was trying to do that kind of dramatic voice.

No matter what, I can't sound like John Lennon. But I can do Tom Jones.

I do think that I can sing, though I actually like voices I can't imitate.

I felt I had a good ear, and I had the ability to sing like my influences.

They really can't imagine what my voice is like. Every time I sing a song, they are very surprised.

People ask me where I got my singing style. I didn't copy my style from anybody.

I don't think I sound like Janis Joplin. I'm a woman with a raspy voice.

I wouldn't even dare to sing like Ed Sheeran.

I'm very lucky in the sense that I've got a voice that's distinctive. Not good, but distinctive. That's a very useful thing to have in this business. I'm glad on the one hand that I've got it, but I wish it was more powerful. I wish I had a greater range. I wish it was more accurate at times.

I'm not the best singer in the world; I'm just good at picking up what I want to sound like.

I feel like I have to create the Keith Whitley sound. That doesn't mean I can't borrow from the people I grew up listening to, but it doesn't serve any purpose to sing the same kind of songs they sang. When you do that, it's going to come out sounding like an imitation, whether it's meant to or not.

I remember Elvis as a young man hanging around the Sun Studios. Even then, I knew this kid had a tremendous talent. He was a dynamic young boy. His phraseology, his way of looking at a song, was as unique as Sinatra's. I was a tremendous fan, and had Elvis lived, there would have been no end to his inventiveness.

I approach the singing kind of like with dialect thoughts in my mind. I have to sound like this on certain things to give that Frankie Valli flavor.

Mr. Presley has no discernible singing ability . . . For the ear he is an unutterable bore, not nearly so talented as Frank Sinatra back in the latter's rather hysterical days at the Paramount Theater.

Almost no one sings like Elvis Presley any more.

I think I popped out of the womb singing Diana Ross.

I love singing with my mouth open. And I'm actually able to sing even better that way.

I'm a huge mimic. That's how I learned to sing. I listened to a lot of Freddy Mercury, obviously.

Elvis's voice was unique. Like so many others, he had natural, technical ability, but there was something in the humanity of his voice, and his delivery.

I can't sing anything like my dad.

Glenn Hughes is one of the most naturally talented musicians, but he's still copying Steve Wonder to this day, so I can't call him a bona fide member of Deep Purple.

I would say I was, I guess, a toddler when I actually found my passion because, when I was little, I used to mimic all these movies and sing all this music that you wouldn't think a toddler would know. I would think my passion just started there, and it just grew with me.

I'm drawn to singers who have something different to say vocally, and Adele would be in there.

Some people are really surprised that I can sing different ways.

Exene taught me how to bend my notes when I sing. That's her style. And I learned that from her.