Beth Gibbons Quotes

People ask me if I left the lyrics open to ambiguity. Of course I did. I wanted to make a whole series of complex statements. The lyrics had to do with the state of society at the time.

You can't ask me to explain the lyrics because I won't do it.

There's not only emotion in the way you sing but also in what you sing. That way I can compensate it.

You know, when I did 'American Idol' the three times, I tried to tell these kids you have to tell the story of the lyric.

It's what people don't say that is often the most revealing.

I've always felt that the quality of the voice is where the real content of a song lies. Words only suggest an experience, but the voice is that experience.

As much as I appreciate people putting me in the category of these very acrobatic belters, I feel like my strength is my... interpretation and my truthfulness with songs, and I don't want young people to think it's all about the high notes that they have to hit.

When I hear someone, instantaneously, I'm like, 'Who's singing?' You're giving people so much of yourself, and my voice is the most natural, distinctive tool I have. It's up to me to express myself on a wider scale than just writing vocal melodies and lyrics.

I learnt early on that your audience take the songs in the way they want to rather than the way you might want them too.

It is important that the audience should understand every syllable of every word, for only then can they grasp the meaning of the song.

My songs were always about the tone of voice rather than the words.

In our hands, even the straightest lyric sounded shady.

I love having those lyrics that at first make you think it's about one thing, but it's really about something so much more.

When I sing, it's different from when I speak in a very interesting way. I think that, when you're singing, a message is carried in a different way. I don't know if that emotion needs a melody.

I studied other singers, so I would learn how to phrase, and learn how to breathe. And the main thing was, I learned how to inhabit my song.

I found my own voice slowly. I don't do big tricks like Mariah Carey, so I've found this weird way of singing that works for me.

Take 'The Stroke,' for instance. Plenty of people saw sexual connotations in that song but to me it was about what goes on in the business world.

I'm not the best at expressing my feelings other than in songs or on paper.

My writing is not just all facts and voices. I strive to create a text that works as a sign, pointing out undercurrents that lie beneath the facts.

I always try, when I'm singing songs, to interpret them the way that I would've arranged them. I think about the melody first, and then I pull out my guitar and start singing it.

Music reaches people in a way that simple spoken words just can't.

'Khamoshi' gave me the chance to prove that expressions can also say what dialogue could.

I feel like the falsetto is my niche and my sound and something different.

If a symbol should be discovered in a painting of mine, it was not my intention. It is a result I did not seek. It is something that may be found afterwards, and which can be interpreted according to taste.

People who create art would be fools to assume they know exactly what people are going to think of it.