Benjamin Clementine Quotes

Performing as a musician is a lot different than performing as an actor. As an actor, you can hide behind the character in the play, and there's a director and other actors. When you're a musician, you're right there. It's sort of like being a comedian. You're giving the audience in real time something authentic from yourself. As an actor, my bullshit meter was going off like crazy at my first attempts to find my own rock star.

Me in my music and onstage - that's me without any fears of judgement; that's me when I'm shining.

As a stand up, and often in acting, there is no place for the most intense feelings. Rage, genuine sorrow, naked hope... These things don't fit on a comedy stage and if you act you'll get to express them once in a while. Music is a place for the intensely personal.

I put my emotions in my music and I want people to relate to that.

Acting is largely about putting on masks, and music is about removing them.

There's times when I'm really shy, so these roles that I get to play, they're how I would love to really be. And that's why I love doing stand-up, because it gives me the freedom to say what I really want to say. I think that's why it's my favorite thing to do.

It was during this [as a kid] time that I came out of my shell vocally and performance wise, I learned how to really and truly sing in a different way.... my way. It was an amazing experience because I also realized my lifelong dream - to sing my own songs...I have something to say and it was a great release for me to share that part of myself with others.

It's always nice to be able to capture your life's experiences in a song and hold the emotion in that way.

Strangely, I feel that I become increasingly reclusive in my normal life and more open and candid in my music.

Rap helps me connect emotionally.

I think comedy I've learned is really just about relaxing and trusting yourself and allowing yourself to fail.

My improv definitely shows a different side of myself, which is more true to what my real humor is and what my real personality is, and I think - I guess 'wild' is a good word for it. I'm still sweet! But I won't let anyone walk all over me.

I include myself in the posters because I feel like it forms a more intimate relationship between the artist and the person passing by. And it's important to include some vulnerability and use fears and rejections and various aspects from my own life so people look at my work as more than greeting card fodder.

I was a shy kid with a broom handle that I pretended was a microphone.

Whether it be in acting, music, or even in dancing, I only want to do things that I truly connect to, and with my music, it's everything that I am.

I love to sing and I do think that my strength as a singer is... I think I have a voice that is certainly sufficient under most any circumstances... but I think my strength is that I really am an actor and I really do have to own what I am saying.

I've always been slightly afraid of coming out with my record because it's so personal to me. Now it doesn't feel as frightening as I thought it would.

If I have something inside me that I want to get out, I'll just beat it out on the banjo right then and there.

I find a therapy in playing music, in many different ways.

This is what I believe about performing: There is no reason to be on stage - there is no reason to be there - if you're not going to put all your baggage somewhere else and just be honest. Whatever you're doing - screw it up, do great - just be there, and be honest. That's the most important thing.

With music, you're really showing someone a piece of your soul. You're saying, 'This is mine. I wrote this, I made this, I'm performing this. This is how I'm presenting it to you.' There's something really scary about that, but there's also something next-worldly about it, too.

As a singer I tried on all these hats, these voices, these clothes, and eventually out came me.

You've got a song you're singing from your gut, you want that audience to feel it in their gut. And you've got to make them think that you're one of them sitting out there with them too. They've got to be able to relate to what you're doing.

Songwriting is like a therapy, it's a connection that you have with another person, and I'm not scared of it at all for some reason.

All I knew was that I was writing something out of my very guts, and that I was content.