Mark Hoppus Quotes

I came in with a completely new perspective. I would write songs and they would pick tunes they felt were in the Purple vein.

I was trying to take the band in a direction that I thought was appropriate, and Roth was trying to take the band in more of a Las Vegas direction. And there he is.

I am Evanescence. I am the only original member. I have basically hired the band. Evanescence has become me. It is mine and it's exactly how I want it to be.

I had no problem with Ritchie. Ritchie and I never argued. We never had a problem. I think I was always able to write the things that he wanted - until he decided he wanted to be a pop star. And then he started doing pop music. And once he did that, that was the end for me.

I think The Czars had an identity crisis, as we were five guys pulling in different musical directions.

We kind of established in Sons of Apollo right from the get go that it would be a very collaborative process musically, but after that, I was going to take the reins and control everything else beyond that the way I did with Dream Theater.

One of the big things that broke the band up for me, which I've become much clearer on over the years, was that I had no desire to be famous.

And Paul Moravec, not being a theater person, would always trust me when I said things that I am like, "you're going to need another 10 seconds of music year to get them across the stage." But I always knew that the people were going to be coming to hear his music of which my words are going to be a part. It was clear that he wanted to go and direction A., and I wanted to go and direction B. We would've gone and direction A. That's the most important piece of advice I can give to anybody who finds themselves in an opera, or musical comedy situation like that.

I don't think I'd be able to flat-out write a pop song and make it satisfying to me. I'm ready to make a consistent sound in whatever way I can.

I probably spent more time listening to albums than writing songs. But I think that gave me all the tricks in terms of wordplay, from how I pronounced my words to the actual delivery.

I think if I could ever write with someone, I'd love to write a song with Loretta Lynn or Dolly Parton.

If I write songs and I think they sound good, then that's it. That's what I do. I'm not a technical musician, which is fine for rock and roll.

I'm a songwriter. I've got ideas in the closet that just didn't work out with my band, that I think, "This is a great idea, it's just the wrong guys."

Well, at the very beginning of the Amboy Dukes, I was doing background but I never sang my own songs. I would sing them for the guys to show them how I wanted the songs to go, but I always had lead vocalists.

You've got to concentrate on the business of entertaining and writing songs. Always think different from the next person. Don't ever do a song as you heard somebody else do it.

It was always very important for us that we presented ourselves as a band, because it's a three-part writing process and it's a three-part decision making process, it's not two producer guys and a girl that sings the songs. It's startling how many people make that assumption.

The songs that I sing and the songs that I write have always just been what I feel my voice does well, and what my inspirations have been and a kind of culmination of everything.

I think great songs can come from anywhere and you constantly have to be able to look out for those. I think a lot of the times people will try too hard to write everything themselves and therefor miss out on great songs that way.

I just never really thought of not being involved, because when I write the songs I take them to a certain place and by that point I kinda know what I want them to sound like.

I was writing "Diamonds and Rust' and it had nothing to do with what it turned out to be. I don't remember what it is, but I think I was writing a song. It was literally interrupted by a phone call, and it just took another curve and it came out to be what it was.

When I first started, I wrote some songs with Linda Perry. She's so instrumental in a lot of artist's lives, listening to you and then helping you write songs that are you, that bring the most of what you are out, whereas a lot of producers might put their stamp on you. I gained confidence because I'm less of a straight-up, traditional vocalist.

I would just be constantly writing all these zingers - like, 'Burn. That would really get her.' And I know people are going to obsess over who it's about, because they think they have all my relationships mapped out. But there's a reason there are not any overt call-outs in that song. My intent was not to create some gossip-fest. I wanted people to apply it to a situation where they felt betrayed in their own lives.

I am writing from the heart and having a fresh approach to things. We [Theocracy] are obviously not trying to musically re-invent the wheel here, and you can certainly hear our influences, but we also don't sound like a copycat of any one band.

I think that anyone really can write songs, it just takes having an idea and a feeling and chasing it, and you can learn more about it. I think that's why I go to so many sessions. It is a craft that you can learn from other people. I find it to be the most fascinating thing. So I write a lot, yeah!

When I was 10, I would hear songs like "I Love You Always Forever" by Donna Lewis on the radio, and I want to make stuff that a 10 year old might hear coming out of the radio and think, "Yeah! I love this!"