Ezra Pound Quotes

I feel that if you made your writing too contrived to meet the market, it wouldn't be any good.

The world is so caught up in the 'American Idol' idealistic sort of tendency in regards to just thinking that this whole thing is what everybody wants, but it doesn't help you make a better record.

I began tailoring my books to cater to one or another universe of readers. I found it incredibly boring; and frankly, it felt stultifying. I'd previously been in advertising. I felt if I was going to create something to fit a specific market, I might as well have stayed with advertising.

I can only say that I myself wrote always as I wished, without a tremendous desire to find the latest thing possible.

It's not always about huge giant commercial success. It's about art.

The only obligation any artist can have is to himself. His work means nothing, otherwise. It has no meaning.

The writers who have nothing to say, are the ones you can buy, the others have too high a price.

My biggest thing is that I never want to sell out. Or be a sellout.

The music business is a crazy game, especially for somebody like me who is really a purist about the art. Trying to balance the pressures of commercialism, it's a tightrope. It's a fine line between sticking to your guns and insanity.

I wouldn't start writing songs like 'Name' all the time just because I thought that's what people wanted to hear. I'll write a song in the same vein because it's what I want to write.

Before the money or anything, number one, it was just to put out real music, real stuff with a passion, real art.

I just want to make great music. There's not a genre that I would categorize it as, but I want it to be true and authentic.

Some musicians feel they have to provide what their audiences expect. They lose the distinction between an artist and an entertainer. I am not an entertainer.

I always make music as an art - it's never been a product for me.

It's about being true to my artistry, which I've been doing. It's super important to do smart films.

I don't see Hollywood as the big enemy, because this is where the money is, and not all of the companies are doing studio movies. I'm not tempted to sell out. If I'm going to become well known, I want it to be for something I'm proud of.

Always focus on the music first. That's the big thing. Staying true to making good music and not sacrificing that for anything.

I wouldn't disrespect myself or my art with any imitations.

There's this concept in urban music and lifestyle that money is everything, and I'm just not with it. If it makes money, it doesn't make it good. If it's good, it's good.

I do not waste my time writing pot-boilers: the pot must be boiled, and even my pot au feu has some chunks of fresh meat in it. ...I have no time to boil myself down; and anyhow I could not do so and preserve all the necessary nutriment and the flavoring on which the digestibility depends.

We wanted to wait until the music felt right. We didn't want to do it, just to do it. We didn't want to do it for money, I guess, is the thing that would have just bummed me out so much.

Writers cannot let themselves be servants of the official mythology. They have to, whatever the cost, say what truth they have to say.

I'm down to sell records but not my soul.

I don't hold it against Dizzy [Gillespie], you know, but if a guy wants to play a certain way, you work towards that. If he stops - he's full of crap, you know. I mean, I wouldn't do it, for no money, or for no place in the white man's world. Not just to make money, because then you don't have anything. You don't have as much money as whoever you're trying to ape; that's making money by being commercial. Then you don't have anything to give the world; so you're not important. You might as well be dead.