Devin Townsend Quotes

You can only really sing about what you know; at least, I can.

I've never recorded anyone else's songs. I'm not interested. If you gave me a song by Bono and Edge and promised me a number one hit with it I'd still say no. That, for me, is not the kind of success I want.

I'm not the kind of writer that can wake up and say, "Okay, I'm gonna write a song today," and have that song be the kind I would want to record. The songs of mine that I end up liking are songs that come from real experience. They're like chapter titles in my life.

I write my songs because I've lived them.

I think that's the only way I know how to write songs, is to think about my life, and also to think about the words at the same time.

When I first started writing songs, I looked around at the bands that were making it, and they all had the original material. Jimi Hendrix, the Beatles, the Stones - everybody was writing their own songs. That's the way that you established your own identity.

All my songs are where I am.

I only record songs that I really like and believe in and can sing with conviction.

People used to say nobody can sing my songs but me - they're too personal.

I don't think songs have to be like these super-#1-smash-hit-sounding songs, because I think it's more important that it's like, 'Hey! This is coming out of me. This is something I connect with. This is something that I like to sing.'

Everything I record, I just try to sound like me and come up with songs that suit what I do, and then just go for it.

My main goal as a songwriter is to make something that inspires people. To write things about my life that people can relate to. Whether it's a whole record or just one song for someone, I hope it can do that for them. Knowing that I have the ability to do that is inspiring to me.

I don't see myself as the boss. I sing and write the songs, and it would feel strange if somebody else wrote the lyrics I sang.

I always try to put something personal on my albums just to give people out there a little piece of my history and how I got where I am and who I am.

I always make music that is true to my spirit.

When I want to put out an album, I want to write it. I want to be able to say that I wrote my album, and all this stuff is from me.

I've always written about things that cause me to feel something.

Every song I've ever written has been based in reality, based in fact, things that happen to me.

Songwriting is such an intricate part of me as an artist and as a person; I couldn't just let someone else do it.

Don't imitate. Write what you know about, that has to be your goal.

I wanted to come through with my own voice and, hopefully, have it affect people. I want people to know that I'm not an Elvis impersonator.

The way I write my songs is that I have to believe what I'm writing about, and that's why they always end up being so personal - because the kind of artists I like, they convince me, they totally win me over straight away in that thing. Like, 'Oh my God, this song is totally about me.'

I always like to write where I'm at in real life into whatever I'm working on.

Every writer is going to end up drawing from their own experiences in one way or another.

Ed Sheeran wrote his songs, so I wanted to write my own songs.