Roland Gift Quotes

I grew in the inner city, listening to Stevie Wonder, Donny Hathaway, James Brown, The Commodores - lots of soul music.

Somebody said I sound like an old lady, and I was really insulted by that. I'm trying to sound like Skip James and Smokey Robinson and Marvin Gaye.

I've grown up on gospel and blues music, and now it's a huge part of who I am.

From the spiritual came the blues, gospel, and rhythm-and-blues. I heard all of that music growing up, and that has influenced how I approached classical music. I'm sure of it.

The falsetto stuff, it must be a reaction to the black gospel singers that I really enjoy listening to.

It's definitely an influence, I mean how can you not say you are influenced to play rock.

I do have very solid reggae roots based on the fact that I'm Jamaican, and so that is a part of myself; even if I never do all reggae, it has to come out in some way because that's who I am.

I love Cher Lloyd's music. I didn't actually hear her music as I was creating my own, but it's cool that we have styles that are considered to be similar.

The many sounds of Memphis shaped my early musical career and continue to be an inspiration to this day.

I wanted to bring the R&B flavor and other Westernized sounds to my music, because that's the type of music I grew up listening to.

When I was a kid, I remember trying to emulate Stevie Wonder's sound, and Donny Hathaway's sound. It's just part of who I am - I'm just a soulful kind of dude.

I grew up in a jazz household. They made me listen to jazz before I could hear my Motown.

Growing up, I listened to a lot of everything - I fell in love with music, when I discovered people like Lauryn Hill and Tracy Chapman, people whose voices I could really feel, people with a lot of soul. That's what I'm drawn to as a musician: Anybody that has their own voice and their own point of view.

I'm touched by the Beatles. I want some of the music I do to reflect that. Here I am. I love Sly Stone and James Brown and Stevie Wonder, and I want my music to reflect some of that. Here I am. I'm touched by Jon Hendricks. I want some of my music to reflect that. And when I write, you're going to hear it.

I got the idea of what a band should be from listening to Booker T and Otis Redding.

When I was 14, I heard Otis Redding in a club local to me, and I was blown away. It leaped out at me and went straight to my heart. I set my sights on singing like that.

The very first show I ever saw was The Judds, and that influenced me to not play country music.

Soul and blues were a definite influence on me. It was raw and naked emotion which you didn't get much where I come from.

I learn tons of John Frusciante's licks from the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I'm never going to play like the Chili Peppers, but I might use that if I've got a dub beat or reggae thing mixed with a soul thing.

The blues is played everywhere. There's no place I've been where they don't have blues or aren't interested in blues.

I grew up with go-go music. We wasn't really hip-hop fans.

The album that defined my childhood was probably Ella Fitzgerald's 'Greatest Hits,' whereas my half-sister, who didn't have the same conservative upbringing, was listening to Cash Money and crunk.

I was just fascinated by the blues.

We had some Stevie Wonder and Luther Vandross, but there's a lot of hip-hop and other black music that I just never grew up on. My parents didn't listen to anything other than black gospel.

I think of people like Ray Charles, Otis Redding, and Isaac Hayes. They all came out of the South, and they followed a certain tradition and energy. That's no knock to groups like The Temptations or The Supremes, not at all, but they were way more polished in how they did things.