Brian McKnight Quotes

Songs are not on a conveyor belt. I'm not chopping them up and putting them out.

Writing the songs and producing the songs and arranging them and recording them is your canvas and your palette and your brush.

You work in a band, and it tends to be more like moviemaking, I think. It tends to be more of a conscious, verbalized and, to some degree, political process.

A lot of my songs, they're like puzzle pieces, and there's just one way to put them together. You could, if you needed to, get the scissors out and cut up things to make them work. But I don't want to do that.

I'm doing more than just making songs for the radio. I want it to be a well rounded sounding experience.

I just do what I do. I like to make music.

I think that the process of making music is a hard one to describe as well.

The actor is concerned with his own bit of it, but the director's somehow trying to work the whole thing into a much bigger picture. It's like conducting an orchestra.

The artist never really has any control over the impact of his work. If he starts thinking about the impact of his work, then he becomes a lesser artist.

I was trying to do the same thing that I always do which is make an interesting record.

I've never worried about how a new release will be received. I simply try to do the best I can and leave the rest to the gods. The music industry in those terms is something I loathe and detest. It conjures up images of a gigantic factory spewing out parts of the machine.

That's what I like to do, I like to make songs.

I read an interview with Mark Wahlberg, and he was like, 'I might read a script and love it, but it's all about the filmmaker.' I think that's a good lesson for me.

My approach is to be part of a band that makes music, not hit songs.

Writing music and lyrics, you tend to become a control freak - sitting alone in your room with a bare light bulb over your head, writing communist manifestos.

I go in and sing the song and arrange it and mix it and that's it. It's no different than playing in clubs.

There was no such thing as production at Starday. We'd go in with the band, we'd go over the song, I'd look over and tell the steel player to take a break or kick it off, and I'd get the fiddle to play a turnaround in the middle.

I'll come in with a string of riffs and direct the musical ideas. But you still need a band and their input to make the ideas come alive. You can't underestimate band chemistry.

I like to oversee what I do, so I have a hand in writing my songs. I also have people there to help me with my vision.

For the most part, I like to record music as I write it.

I find it hard to get excited by just a sound. I have to have a song there, then I'll find what used I can make of that sound within the song.

I just happened to start playing music for the conceptual ideas.

I feel that recording a song already compromises the magical music one can create in the mind, so the fewer people watering down this process the better.

When the songs pop out, that's like the climax of us building.

I can get a tune out of most things with strings, but I'm not really sure I'm what could be called a musician. I find it fascinating working with people who can play other instruments and sing.