Jamie Cullum Quotes

My girlfriend at the time convinced me to send these songs to Cavity Search. When they wanted to put out my record I was totally shocked.

I never thought in my wildest dreams I'd ever be offered a record deal, and to get a Christmas No. 1 would be huge for any performer, let alone an ex-footballer.

I'm really happy with Elektra, I don't have anything bad to say about them at all. I always knew a major label was the right place for me to be. I never really had an opportunity to go to an independent label anyway.

I'd done recordings, little demos, since I was in college, which I used to get gigs. But I never thought I'd have a record label.

There was a bidding war between Epic Records and Jive - now RCA - which was bittersweet. Just having labels bid over me was really cool, but I ended up going with Jive because it felt better over there, and they have my favorite artists like Usher, Chris Brown, and Justin Timberlake.

I was signed to a record label when I was younger. I was in a group, and I just wasn't - personally, I wasn't ready to get out there. I don't know. It was a pop group. Not like the Spice Girls, but when you don't have any control over anything, it's disheartening.

I was signed to a record label at the same time as my friend Elliot Murphy, who makes great records to this day.

I met Ne-Yo in London. I sang for him and he said, 'I want to sign you.' It was amazing - it meant my name was buzzing around the industry and I got to meet lots of different labels.

My record label is treating me like I'm a new artist, which is exciting after all this time.

At 18, I finally came into a relationship with a record label. My family got back on its feet. I was happy.

With my previous record deal, it'd be like, 'OK, so I have this track then, EMI - do you know any singers, maybe? Do you have any singers on your little label there?' And funnily enough, they didn't. But I prefer finding unknown singers myself anyway.

I came into having an artist's career in this very sheepish and directionless way. It's hard to explain, but I was 18 years old and I was ready to go to college; that was the next step for me. Then suddenly I had a song that blew up... and I had this artist's career and I was on tour with these big names and I didn't know what I was doing.

I just think that any person who wants music to be their career shouldn't focus on a record label. I have seen friends who sign to a label too early in their career, and they lost control over their music, and their releases were delayed or never put out.

When I was doing 'Hot Shot,' I didn't even have an album deal.

I started out as a duo with Mis-Teeq's Sabrina Washington, and we worked for four or five years before signing a record deal. I had no money, and I was taking part-time jobs just to earn the train fare to get to rehearsals.

You're just these kids from a small town. You get a record deal, and everything just goes so fast. In the span of five albums... in a way, the band that you started in your bedroom, or your basement or your garage, kind of becomes not your band anymore. It becomes something bigger than you could have known. No one really prepares you.

If a new artist comes, and he doesn't have a good record label to invest in him, then there is no point.

I was like just writing and writing and then I kinda developed my sound. And then, my managers were like, "Okay, we're gonna try to get a deal." And then first it was Interscope, and then it was Atlantic. And then, I ended up signing with Atlantic, but it was like a long process, a really long... it was A LONG PROCESS. I feel like it took me two years to do it.

I always knew I wanted to do music, but it took me a long time to figure out how to exactly do that. With my first record deal, everything kinda fell apart. I wasn't ready for it, I didn't know how to handle the business side at all. I thought as soon as I got a record deal, everything would fall into place and I wouldn't have to really do any work anymore. I could just make music, and be successful. Well that was not the case and everything fell apart for a period of time.

Andrew [Ridgeley] and I had demoed a couple of our songs very cheaply, and we weren't expecting any kind of record deal. We just walked around with our demo tape, trying to find someone to give us the money to demo properly. Instead of that, we got a record contract. It was just an incredibly lucky break.

I started as a writer and when I sent my demos out everyone wanted to know who was singing and if that person wanted a record deal.

When I was 17 years old, Frank DiLeo saw my very first music video and flew to my hometown of Las Vegas to meet with my family and me. Frank told my dad, 'I am coming out of retirement to manage one last big act: Manika.'

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 never thought I would get signed to a label.

If we meet some people that are in love with NFG that are a major label, then we'll sign with them. If we meet people that are in love with NFG that are an independent label - and they have a plan - well, then we'll sign to them. It's completely up to us.