Sampha Quotes

The music comes first. Final lyrics are usually written very close to recording the vocals.

So I'll set a cycle in motion and pop it into record and I'll lay down a drum pattern, a bass line, a keyboard and guitar part, and once the groove is going I launch into the song and sing my song over the top.

For me, making music just starts with a simple melody, and lyrics will come sometime after that.

There's two facets to writing a song. There's you sitting in your room writing the sentiments of the song; the lyrics, the melody and the changes, and then there's the part where you go into the studio and you put clothing on it.

I've written more songs for this record than I ever have in the past so I'm trying to give it a lot of special attention to be sure my ideas really get translated right.

I had a really pleasant time composing music for 'Raaga.'

Music really does just boil down to basically, essentially songwriting chords and melodies.

I like being in a recording studio. I like watching a song go from the simplicity of the original music.

I write most of my own lyrics for my album and I am helping to produce some of the songs as well.

But there's a thin line between songwriting and arranging.

The act of song writing and recording became one and the same to me; because I essentially recorded everything I did from the day I began trying to write songs. I've always had a lot to say. I'd always written poems.

Before you worry about what genre it is, about whether it's a loop or a drum, it's about what suits the song. It's using what's within your reach, but also reaching for everything you can. I don't know if I always get it right, because I don't know every sound yet.

I was trying to do the same thing that I always do which is make an interesting record.

I did record a bunch of stuff, but the thing that usually stops me from doing that is that I'm a terrible singer. I made a bunch of instrumental music, and it feels really good, but just as a singer, I'm not good.

I would start seeing, in just the sense I was saying now, the kind of record it was going to be and what the arrangement demands, and what my vocal part should be in the record. This was all emerging as the song was emerging.

But my role is to just apply the skills I've learned over the years: you listen to the guitar, you listen to the vocal melodies, you listen to the rhythm, and you come up with something that helps you take the song somewhere.

I get very deep into the writing and recording process.

I love writing songs. One of the toughest things is structure; it just works when you use verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge. And as soon as you become aware of that formula, you start to have a bad conscience when you write with that particular structure.

That's what I like to do, I like to make songs.

I think you can have the greatest lyrics in the world and if it doesn't have the best tune in the world it will suck. I mean if the music wasn't important it would just be a poem.

It's not like making records is terrible. Still, I do find the writing of the songs and the live shows to be the things that give you the most clear picture of what it's all about.

I usually write my music on a piano, and I really enjoy performing that way, because that actually shows how the music was in my mind before it actually became an electronic song.

I write music every day.

It's no longer necessary to slave over the vocals. I don't sing the lyrics until I write them, and singing is the very last thing I do. I record the entire track, and then I worry about lyrics and vocals. The music will suggest where the words are going to a certain extent.

I find it harder to write the lyrics afterwards because then you're just trying to fit them into something that's already there.