Rick Nielsen Quotes

I've recorded 25 or 30 albums. I know that sometimes when you work with producers who are kinda dictators, it doesn't help you make a better record.

There hasn't been one moment in my career where I felt I didn't have any control over the creative aspects of my records.

When we came into the studio I became more and more me, making the tracks and choosing the musicians, partly because a great deal of the time during Bridge, Artie wasn't there.

And then the last album, 'Get It', was done over a shorter period of time and I started using other musicians, as opposed to playing all the instruments myself like I did on the other two.

I've been lucky to be able to make the records I've wanted to make. The record company has never pressured me to cut certain songs.

I don't believe in making a record and rushing it.

When I did 'Tapestry' with Carole King, the record was spare and simple, like a demo. If someone had told me to go back and put horns on it, it would've been all wrong. If you're enthusiastic enough to sign an artist, let them do what got you enthusiastic.

I'm going to put music out when I feel like it's ready.

From its conception and that one and only meeting, 'HITNRUN' took about 90 days to prepare its release. If that's what freedom feels like, 'HITNRUN' is what it sounds like.

It's great to be able to find a way to release your music and do what you want to do artistically and not have to just worry about being accepted by the major label industry.

I only think in the following terms: writing, recording, releasing. That's what I have control of. What I don't have control is whether critics or the public like what I do.

On my first album nobody asked me for a lot of advice. It was a producer's album. We were sent the same type songs with stock melodies. It was my first album and I was happy to do about anything they'd ask me.

Being a pop-leaning, female artist, you'd think that I'd have my record company breathing down my neck and trying to control everything I'm doing. Actually, they've just kind of let me take the wheel.

I just think that any person who wants music to be their career shouldn't focus on a record label. I have seen friends who sign to a label too early in their career, and they lost control over their music, and their releases were delayed or never put out.

There are those people who try to change what you're doing. We don't like that. When we went into the studio for 'City of Evil,' we had 99 percent of the songs finished and ready to record.

The world has changed a lot since I started making records.I used to go into a studio and there were songs there, chosen for me to see if I liked them. I wasn't encouraged to write.

I'm trying to give people the chance to put out their music without the bullshit pressures of other labels.

I'm in total control. I write the songs, decide what to sing and how to sing. I even control the recording process. But, with a film, there is no control at all.

Someone told me once that Lucinda Williams takes six years between albums, and that's what stuck to me; it's like, you really are a factory. You don't do things to make them, on your own time.

I don't get why radio shows allow artists to do shows without creative control, without any art direction at all. Instead of that, I get their press guys, their camera guys to be my backdrop of my show.

When I did 'Ephorize,' I didn't know that later on I'd be releasing another album. It just came.

We can't seem to put out an album without any drama.

If I could have stayed independent from the jump, then, maybe, things would have been different. 'Return of 4Eva' would have been an album instead of a mixtape.

I'm not just going to get a deal; I'm going to get the deal. And in my deal I got by signing with No I.D. to Def Jam, I got full creative control, the money was great, the contract was good, and I got to create the album that I wanted.

To be honest, we never, ever let business weigh down the creativity of this band.