Frankie Ballard Quotes

An artist don't make you bigger than life - being that person that can break artists can make you bigger than life.

I came to California and got signed at a young age. And it's not like you see in the movies, where you start rubbing shoulders with Timbaland and Pharrell, and you become a giant pop star.

There's a lot of creativity in the industry, but I don't necessarily think that the most creative DJs or producers are always the biggest ones.

I didn't want to just be a rapper, I wanted to be a star.

I knew what I wanted to be, but I didn't know exactly how to get there. I thought you move to Nashville, you sing downtown, and someone discovers you, and you become a country music star. I had no idea.

A record deal is my dream.

I was very ambitious in my dream of being a pop star.

Well, I had a record deal since I was 18, and it got me where I am.

All these interviews I'm doing - this is the kind of stuff that I was dreaming about doing when I was younger. I was praying for people to want to write about me. I wanted people to hear my music. I wanted to perform. I wanted to be on billboards.

When I was growing up, I read Britney Spears' and Mariah Carey's biographies. I just wanted to see how they did it because I was so eager to get into the biz.

We are at a crossroads in the music business: with the rise of the internet, the world we live in has changed, and the past is not coming back. But I see the glass as half-full: the internet and social networking are new avenues for the next Bob Dylan to be born on.

To me, being in the big time is not that big of a deal. I've been there; I know what it is. It's exciting, but it's also a lot of work and pressure. I love sort of flying under the radar where we can play theaters and sell CD's on the Internet, and it's really kind of a cool time.

No, I mean we'd all definitely involved in the music business someway or another, because we're all living with it, and in it, and also we've got all sorts of things we would like to do.

I don't think the label makes the artist or the artist makes the label. It's the music that makes everything work or not.

Translation and UnitedMasters, which is all one company, is my vision and my dream, and I think it's today's reality of the convergence between storytelling, technology, and culture.

By the age of 17, for me, we had got an recording contract, and, boom, I was gone.

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.

Since I was 19, I've said, 'I'm gonna sign for a million.'

Every artist wants something different out the game.

But I sent letters to people in the music business. And one day I got a phone call from somebody and he asked me when I was born and where I was born. And, you know, three or four days later I got a call. Someone said, you know, Yoko Ono wanted to meet me in New York. I got on a plane. And the next day I was having coffee with John Lennon.

I really didn't think I was going to make records to where I make a living out of it.

I am perfectly aware of my position in commercial music.

We never set out to be this punk rock band that's going to stay small and tour in a van forever. We wanted to take our band to a level where we could do everything we want to do.

I think the fact that Gang Starr kept getting more and more successful was the reason we never thought about our age.

I don't think most rock stars are particularly calculating. I don't think they sit there and think, 'I will do this; therefore, on Monday, I will sell another 200,000 records'.