Kanye West Quotes

I wrote my first song, 'Conversion', to this little hip-hop instrumental. I went to an open-mic, plugged my iPod into the P.A., and sang over the beat.

I want to write just as much as Kanye may have for whomever Kanye has written for.

I would write poems and think up melodies to them later.

I'm always writing something. There's always some structure sitting around someplace. There's always things on the computer, things scratched on score paper, legal tablets full of lyrics. It's never not buzzing around me all the time. I'm always doing it.

I don't sit down to write a song, per se.

I sit down and draw from my lyric book. I sit down and start looking through it and see if there is anything that strikes me that I've written.

Typically I go in the studio and whatever I'm contemplating that day will wind up being a song. I don't come in with lyrics... I just go in and let it happen.

It seems to me that those songs that have been any good, I have nothing much to do with the writing of them. The words have just crawled down my sleeve and come out on the page.

I'm always writing lyrics. I have so many lyrics on so many stray pieces of paper. Everywhere.

I know already the music I will write. But the words? I have not yet decided.

Rap is something you can just throw on the skillet and fry up real quick. That's how it comes to me, my train of thought. It's like getting dressed - I don't have to sit down and stare at clothes, I just pick what I like and put it on. But rock, you gotta put it in the oven and let it bake.

After that, I specifically started writing lyrics. I would like sweat and think and get it all together.

For me, making music just starts with a simple melody, and lyrics will come sometime after that.

I don't write poems and put them to music. Just let things flow.

I was never a 'sit down with a notepad and write lyrics' kind of person.

I've written poetry since I was in the first grade, and it wasn't until I was a little bit older that I realized poetry could be put to music and become a song.

Sometimes I'll come up with a lick that I really love, and I'll try to put the right words to it for years. Suddenly something comes to me that works just right.

I've always been a composer dependent on texts.

I can clear my mind, and lyrics just come out; it's very easy for me.

Making music and writing kind of come from the same creative place.

I write lyrics based on music, on a musical flow, and what sounds good at the time.

I usually start with a lyric and see where that takes me.

It took me a long time to stumble upon a sound, and I figured out I wanted to kinda sing rapper's lyrics.

In my opinion, that's one of the hardest things to do in songwriting: crafting a song that speaks to you but, at its core, is a simple concept.

I am always writing music. I have got unlimited ideas because I have been clean and sober for my entire life.