Damon Albarn Quotes

Bluegrass is really a big part of my background.

I've been writing songs since I was like six or seven. I've been writing poetry and short stories and stuff, but my first serious, serious song, I wrote when I was fourteen.

I'm an American songwriter, and I write from a very American perspective, and so did the records I grew up listening to.

I started singing because I come from Wales.

Well, I grew up on the blues, man!

I was born out of classical music.

Mine is not a traditional music, but it comes from a tradition.

The first notes I still play when I start a sound check are classical. Those are my roots.

Growing up in Louisiana, my grandmother gave me an accordion because of our Cajun heritage. What ended up happening was I started learning about more instruments, so I just kind of went that route. Music's really all I've ever done.

My dad was a musician and I traveled around with him, so it was something that I knew.

Is it true that we must accept the music of another race as being that which is American? Have not the white Americans sufficient individuality to develop a characteristic style of composition.

Where I come from, we sing poetry.

I feel that, as a Puerto Rican and Latin American musician, a lot of the stuff that I write, even if I mean it or not, is gonna have some elements of that.

I've been touching instruments since the day I was born. My mother is Brazilian, and she listens to Brazilian music. My father was a musician, and I've seen pictures of him when he was in a band playing guitar and piano. He loved country music, Frank Sinatra, and stuff like that.

Early on, I was a performer playing classical music. It's in my DNA in a way that I can't begin to extract it.

Listening to all these different musical genres from all over the world and listening to my father's record collection, the Irish folk influences from home. Of course they're all in there somewhere hiding within the lyrics and melodies. But rap music was the biggest influence on my way of writing and my performing.

Once I tried to find myself as a musician and a composer, I went back and saw that there was something special about Puerto Rican music. I knew that before, but had never sat down and thought about it. The more I learned about it, the more it found its way into the music I was writing.

That.s what Jazz music is all about.We started the Messengers because somebody had to mind the store for jazz.No America--no Jazz. It is the only culture that America has brought forth.

I've always had music in my blood.

As a songwriter, we're looking for a good story, and we're always looking to push the limits.

I started quite late. I only discovered that I could write a song when I was, like, 17... some musicians, they're starting out, writing songs when they're, like, 12, 13. I never thought I would go into songwriting when I was that young.

People often ask me why I sing with a strong Irish accent. I suppose when I was five years old, I spoke with a strong Irish accent, so I sang with one, too.

I come from a family of musicians.

I come from a small village and have had no formal training in music or any classes from the masters of Indian classical music.

We've played music all our lives.