Eliot Sumner Quotes

My first album, I had to write everything. Nobody was going to send me stuff just because I had a little success.

I mean there are tons of reasons. Well first of all. I write my own record. I don't take other people's materials. And I have a job which is being Willa Ford on top of getting back in the studio and writing and recording.

My plan was always to leave school and live in a flat with some friends, have a 9 to 5 job, and try to get as many gigs as I could. I wanted to keep writing and then eventually, in my twenties, head to a record label and hope they'd sit down and listen to my book of songs, sign me as a songwriter and maybe an artist in development.

I was never in the business of trying to put my name out there - I was really focused on music and records and being in the studio.

I never intended to set out and be a singer-songwriter. I just sort of became one because I put out my own record.

Yeah, man I am going to be writing a book soon. The reality of being in a rock band in the music business'.

All I've ever wanted to do was play music and go on the road and make records.

I don't do sessions for myself ever. I'm always working, writing for pop sessions. And what happens is that sometimes I like a song so much, I keep it for myself.

I can take a three-year-old and make a hit record.

I never stopped recording, but I went through a period where... The one thing that a lot of people don't know is that for as long as I've been as artist, I've been a writer and a producer.

I'm now 23 and feel like it's been a full 'crash course' in the music industry - I've only just found my sound.

I feel like I just learned a whole new world when I was studying under Ne-Yo when I was about 17. I was living on Ne-Yo's manager's couch, making three songs a day.

I've been in the songwriting circuit as well. I've been in a couple writing camps where there are seven top writers or whatever, and they're writing songs for a young girl or a young guy that are coming up, and they're kind of nuts.

One not-to-be-mentioned major said they would sign me if I worked with a team of songwriters to help me finish songs, ha! Of course, in hindsight, I should've done it just to see what that would have been like.

I've watched songwriters, writers, producers, even artists that I've written hits for come and go. But to the world, it looked like Justin Bieber was my first success.

I make a lot of money off featuring, doing songs with up-and-coming artists. I can charge someone $10,000 to $15,000 to do one song.

I've always wanted to produce a whole album for an artist.

I'm so hands-on and involved in my own music that I feel like if I put the same effort into another artist, then I can definitely cultivate something great.

I wanted to become a better songwriter, so it seemed like a no-brainer to move to Nashville, where some of the best writers in the world live.

Growing up, I was trying to make it in music. I was grinding, which is just what I loved doing. I didn't have nothing else to do. In my spare time, I'd record myself. Find a beat, pulling em up. Just making something and creating for me.

A lot of new artists sign their deal and then go into a development stage for a year or two or sometimes never get out of it. For me, because I had been a working songwriter in town, I had a collection of songs that I was ready to make into an album. At the time, I didn't realize it was becoming an album, but it was.

I came to realize that if I was going to succeed in the music industry, I was going to have to learn how to perform my songs myself.

The first album is a special one for most bands or most artists in general. The first record is your whole life, and then after that you have a couple of months to write stuff and get it for the next record.

Signing with Sony/ATV was life changing for me.

I consider myself a songwriter... I guess the business end is my songs and the fun part is playing the guitar.