Taylor Hawkins Quotes

I find that I like what I like. I like a strong melody, I like an inventive structure and I have to like the singer's voice or I have no interest in it.

A great guitar solo is really a song within a song. You can always go off and do your pageantry, but it has to be structured.

Your solos should be as interesting as any other part of the song.

If I'm proud of one thing in my playing, it's being able to slow it down and focus on the melody.

Melody is the essence of music. I compare a good melodist to a fine racer, and counterpointists to hack post-horses; therefore be advised, let well alone and remember the old Italian proverb: Chi sa più, meno sa— Who knows most, knows least.

I have a lot of my mother in me, but I was just born with the same parts as my father. I don't sound like him. I mean, I can do an impression of him right now, and I do not sound like him. I sound like me. My sense of rhythm I learned from my mother. My melodies, I think sometimes, I get from my mother.

I'm into the whole song-as-a-piece-of-music thing: if it literally doesn't call for it, if it already has enough stuff going on, then it's okay not to play a solo.

A great song has to stand on its own, just singing and playing, and the rest is frosting. But you have to pay attention to the frosting.

There are certain choices you make as a songwriter, based on vowel sounds and melody and chord changes.

Being the drummer of Fall Out Boy, and any other project I've ever done, is most importantly about playing for the music. Staying out of the way when it's needed and playing more when it makes sense.

The first song I ever wrote was in grade eight.

For me, if we're going to have a guitar solo, it needs to be over the top.

A lot of people love men that rock; I love men that love a good melody and a good harmony.

I always imagined having so much energy on stage, versus me being somewhat chill, soulful R&B.

I grew up watching Gregory Hines banging out rhythms like drum beats, and Jimmy Slyde dancing these melodies, you know, bop-bah-be-do-bap, not just tap-tap-tap. Everyone else was dancing in monotone, but I could hear the hoofers in stereo, and they influenced me to have this musical approach towards tap.

I try and treat songwriting as something that I have to practise every day.

My muse has always been the piano.

What I learned about music is that it can have nothing to do with words, instrumentation, image, message, or meaning. The meaning is the melody, the notes, the rhythm - music for the sake of its own beauty, with nothing more required to express itself.

I was obsessed with what a song was and what the possibilities of language in a song are.

I'm attached to the beat. The beat speaks words. I love music.

It was never so much the heavy metal thunder that got me. I was into players who played with taste and did these walking bass parts. If you can play like that, it really opens up the music. You can't just pound away. After a while it's like, 'So what? What else you got?'

The one thing about songwriting that's been consistent is that I do it for the love of a good melody.

People tend to put too much focus on the lyrics. It's not the be-all and end-all of our songs.

As a drummer, I always approach things as, 'I want to play just enough to keep other drummers interested, but not enough to go over the average listener's head.'

There are times, like with Dire Straits, where you can get as close as you can be to being good at your instrument and not cross over to that tasteless place.