Sufjan Stevens Quotes

People need to put my music in a perspective where they use other established artists from the past, and almost all the names I see related to my music are great musicians.

Even for the people in the business who are real music lovers it's really about putting things in the right boxes, and my style doesn't fit into a box.

And so many of the kinds of labels you get stuck with don't really tell the story; Progressive, Art Rock, Noise Music, Downtown - it ends up being a struggle to stay out of debates that other people are having around you.

I'm not technically adept at music, but I'd love to be part of a discussion of where progressive rock ends and country music begins.

I don't like the word 'urban' because I think it's a bit of a generalisation and they use it to class music, but I don't think it's a word that necessarily classes music.

I think that most people who write about music just want to fill some paper. They're not really interested in getting to the heart of something. Otherwise, they wouldn't write what they write.

Defining something being a Fleetwood Mac song is calling it a Fleetwood Mac song, you know? Nothing becomes Fleetwood Mac until that's what you call it.

Contextualize the music. I really hope to do more of that.

I think what people get confused about is that they want to label me as this EDM girl, but a lot of this stuff is genre-less.

I hate genres. I think they're just marketing labels.

I hate how things must be classified. How this is applied to musicians implies that they somehow contrive their products and have studied the demographics of the audience.

I think music needs to be presented in a way so that kids can grasp songs, dances, simple music that's associated with some particular defining moment in human experience.

When you don't know what the band looks like, it puts the emphasis on thinking and taking the music and message more seriously.

Every time a new rock singer comes out they don't say, 'Are you the new John Lennon?' Every time a new rapper comes out, it's not, 'Are you the new Dre?' I am never sure why this sort of genre, the categorization is so strong. I have not earned the right to be called the young Sinatra, but give me time.

When I first released music, and no one knew what I looked like, I would read comments like: 'I've never heard anything like this before; it's not in a genre.' And then my picture came out six months later: now she's an R&B singer.

I don't like music docs, usually. There's nothing to really say. What can you say about music? Normally, you can't say too much. There are a few really good ones, but the majorities are boring, I think.

I can't tell you what genre Maroon 5 is in. I don't know if they're rock or pop or alternative. I don't know what they are. I have a hard time separating that stuff. I just know what I like when I hear it.

It is better to make a piece of music than to perform one, better to perform one than to listen to one, better to listen to one than to misuse it as a means of distraction, entertainment, or acquisition of 'culture.'

I hate talking about music, to tell you the truth.

We don't really talk about music that much, to be honest with you. It's not some I usually - I can't really talk about other people's tracks never mind my own.

I really was kind of like a musical nerd. I would watch VH1's 'Behind The Music.' That was heavy when I was a kid. I would sit up and want to watch that all day instead of going outside sometimes.

AC/DC, Def Leppard, Alice Cooper - I learned stories of all these guys. That's when I fell in love with Queen, which is one of my favorite bands of all time... I started paying attention to what made music good. I started paying attention to why I liked it.

Reviewing music or reviewing anything is a writing job. It's nice if you are experienced in the field you are writing about, but writing is what you are doing.

And why is our music called world music? I think people are being polite. What they want to say is that it's third world music. Like they use to call us under developed countries, now it has changed to developing countries, it's much more polite.

A lot of music fans are still interested in insightful perspectives on music - maybe even more interested than ever, since everyone needs help making sense of the incredible variety of sounds that have sprung up in the wake of the Internet revolution. There's a lot of room for unique, qualified voices who can provide good reads.