Johnny Cash Quotes

Rick Rubin said, well, I don't know that we will sell records. He said, I would like you to go with me and sit in my living room with a guitar and two microphones and just sing to your heart's content everything you ever wanted to record. I said, that sounds good to me. So I did that. And day after day, three weeks, I sang for him.

I like to work with people who have a sense of putting a song over, and can sing in tune, and with passion. With technology you can polish a turd, but there's still no button you can press for passion.

I always felt like I could combine good pop songs that are easy for people to like with a real person and a real mind and integrity.

I take making music seriously, but you have to have a sense of humor about yourself. I invite people into my life. That's how I do it.

When it comes to music, it's my clothes, it's my guitar, it's my voice, it's my song.

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

I'm always gonna be all over my CD the most, of course. My talent is my talent. I ain't really tripping off no ego; I just like to make good music with good people.

I learned from Van Morrison and BB King that the first take is the best. It's about capturing a moment. It's the same as love's first kiss. If you try to do it again, it doesn't work so well.

I really like the thing I did with Martina McBride. I had that song sitting around for a long time.

I don't really care about audio quality. If people saw some of the ways that I record stuff, they'd see I don't care in that respect. I obviously care about things sounding good, but I think quality exists through other things like emotionally connecting with a lyric or a feeling, or whatever.

All my first albums, they're full of heart and emotion, and the songs are wonderful, but they wouldn't have been the takes I would have chosen.

I've finally figured out how to make a Rodney Crowell record, and that's let it be, leave the mistakes.

When we record a song, like 'Bedside Manner,' it's important that the next time I write a somber, mid-tempo song that we don't treat it the same way.

I remember when I did 'Live SheckWes, Die SheckWes,' and when I did 'Mo Bamba,' I one-taked those because it came from my heart.

The identity of each band is what's important for me production-wise.

We cut songs that touch us because if they don't touch us first, there's no way in the world we're going to be able to sell those songs to somebody else.

I'm not one of those guys who can just take a guitar into a room and come out with a song. I need all my instruments dotted around.

Rod's a great singer. He's got a great voice, but there's no point to put a 30-piece orchestra behind him. I'm not going to knock anybody's right to make a living but you can always tell if somebody's heart and soul is into something, and I didn't think Rod was into it in that way.

The Ramones couldn't play in my key. They couldn't switch keys, so Ed Stasium literally had to play all the instruments for my version of "Rock 'N' Roll High School," and I always thought that was so weird, because it's not the Ramones playing. It's the producer, who happened to just be a musician and could play everything.

Whether it be current or past, every single song that I recorded is about me. It's a peek into my life, past and present. Maybe it's coming from my theater and performance background, but nothing felt right unless I could relate to it.

I try not to think about the idea of reaching more and more people, because once you get in that mindset, I think you lose the point of why you're doing it in the first place. Still, the best feeling I ever get is when I finish a song, and it exists, and it didn't exist before, and now it's there, and it makes me feel a certain way.

We write so many songs, it is difficult to narrow them down.

I write with music. I write scenes in movies that hopefully can earn the use of some songs that are powerful to me.

I'm just doing what I do best and that's what makes good music, and that's how you can relate to people.

When I recorded for Columbia, I could usually do anything in one take...I would invariably want to use the first take because that would be the one that was spontaneous and fresh.