Henry Rollins Quotes

I think, there are a couple of songs. I'm really proud of How far I'll Go. I literally locked myself up in my childhood bedroom at my parents' house to write those lyrics. I wanted to get to my angstiest possible place. So I went method on that.

I write in blood because I remember what it felt like to bleed.

Writers often write their best when they are feeling their worst

If I'm not crying while writing a song, I'm not doing it right.

In the early days, it was, you know, I used to weep while I was writing. I used to grab at any kind of anything, any hint, any tip of how to make it easy.

I write most of my songs when I'm in a bad mood.

My identity started developing through the songs I was writing.

As a youngster when I started writing and stuff, I did actually write more from other people's perspectives. When I hit 18 and something happened to me that hurt me, I discovered that writing the truth is really therapeutic and amazing. Every single one of my songs is about something very personal to me and I could tell anyone what it's about, each song. Like a diary, basically.

Writing the songs is always emotional and most of the vocals on there are the first three takes from the demos, because they give so much more. You're in that moment, so it speaks for itself.

It's pretty much rock-'n'-roll. I sit down and start feeling stuff and writing.

I liked writing the negative ads more than - because it's more minor chords.

I wonder if I can write this history, or if on every page there will be some sneaking show of a bitterness I thought long dead. I think myself cured of all spite, but when I touch pen to paper, the hurt of a boy bleeds out with the sea-spawned ink, until I suspect each carefully formed black letter scabs over some ancient scarlet wound.

I'm not used to writing about happy emotions, I'm just used to pulling from my sad or angry - happy emotions are very hard for me to portray in music.

I think in order to write really well and convincingly, one must be somewhat poisoned by emotion, dislike, displeasure, resentment, fault-finding, imagination, passionate remonstrance, a sense of injustice-they all make fine fuel.

The best emotions to write out of are anger and fear or dread. The least energizing emotion to write out of is admiration. It is very difficult to write out of because the basic feeling that goes with admiration is a passive contemplative mood.

I think when I first started discovering I could write songs, I was so naive. And it was after I got broken up with and had my heart sliced up into a bunch of little pieces that I was like, "I'm going to say this." I didn't even know how to play guitar.

I never sit and fill a journal with lyrics. Most of the time I'm trying to write a feeling, not a story. I'm not necessarily trying to describe the details of a place or event so much as the feeling of the thing. It is a kind of weird alchemy that is elusive until it feels right.

It's easier to write about heartbreak after you've had your heart broken. You have more material to draw from, you can extrapolate from your own experiences and make reasonable assumptions about how your characters would feel and act.

What you said hurt me very much. I cried all the way to the bank.

I get an audience personally involved in a song - because I'm involved myself. It's not something I do deliberately: I can't help myself. If the song is a lament at the loss of love, I get an ache in my gut. I feel the loss myself and I cry out the loneliness, the hurt and the pain that I feel.

I think the more emotional you are, the better. I'm sort of writing [songs] as I go and I can never tell how it's going to be or how it's going to feel until I get into the studio. But I definitely think it will. I probably can't help but have the emotions in my voice.

I actually feel something in my chest open, a feeling so intense, it’s like my heart’s about to burst. And I just let it. I just let it out.

Sometimes I write from personal experience, but so much depends on what mood I'm in. If I'm in a good mood, I'll write happier songs.

I know quite well that one needs ridiculous, mad situations like that; one can't write really well about anything else. Why was that old fellow such a marvelous propaganda technician? Because he had so many insane, excruciating things to get excited about. You've got to be hurt and upset; otherwise you can't think of the really good, penetrating, X-rayish phrases.

Before I started writing my album, I didn't tell people many things. But because I'm going to the studio every day and telling strangers my deepest and darkest emotions, it's made me more of an open book. I wear my heart on my sleeve a lot more now than I did.