Authentic Sound Quotes

I know what my sound is. I'm just trying to get it out there how I can explain it. I'm not trying to write or put out some music that doesn't represent me.

There's an edge to real rock 'n' roll. It's all that matters.

I think there's a void for some authentic soul music with an edge. I think there's some people who grew up with Motown and Stevie Wonder that still can appreciate Future, Drake, and all these different things, too, but there shouldn't be a void for those people, as well.

When I go into a room to write, it's like I'm not trying to say, 'I need to write a song that sounds like Eric Church or Jason Aldean.' I just try to get the best song that's in the room that day. Whatever style or sound that may be, I'm not afraid to attack it at that angle.

If we all could sound like we wanted to, we'd all sound like George Jones.

I love commercial music! I can dissect it and criticize it with any critic in the business. But without any thought, I just enjoy it. It's folk music. That's what I'm doing, folk music. I'm not intellectualizing it . . . and making it into a phoney art form. I'm just doing the music I enjoy.

The first record we put out on Fueled by Ramon, 'The Papercut Chronicles,' we had no idea what the term 'producer' meant. It was just us writing songs, and we are trying to go back to that - singing in a room and vibing off each other.

When I was 13, listening to Choice FM, I would listen to a lot of R&B from America, and whenever a British person tried to do it, it didn't really work, they just sounded like they were trying to copy that whole style. Now the music sounds British, something real rather than an imitation.

That is the music that I have always wanted to play: real, genuine guitar music.

The REM and Nirvana successes don't mean much to me except as a potential distraction for bands who want to cash in on the trend. Don't try to sound like someone else. REM and Nirvana don't sound like anyone else.

I try to make music with emotion and integrity. And authenticity. You can feel when something's authentic, and you can feel when it's not: you know when someone's trying to make the club record, or trying to make the girl record, or trying to make the thug record. It's none of that. It's just my emotions.

I just make music based on what I believe.

I'm just excited that I get to put out the music I love versus music just for the sake of it.

I love polished pop music, but stuff like Neil Young's Crazy Horse vibe or Waylon Jennings, that stuff is raw and real.

Real music to me is real; it's what you feel.

A musician should only sound like what they do, and no two musicians sound the same. It's an individual-feel thing, you know?

When I write a song, I always start on acoustic guitar, because that's a good test of a song, when it's really open and bare. You can often mislead yourself if you start with computers and samples and programming because you can disguise a bad song.

I feel like I have to create the Keith Whitley sound. That doesn't mean I can't borrow from the people I grew up listening to, but it doesn't serve any purpose to sing the same kind of songs they sang. When you do that, it's going to come out sounding like an imitation, whether it's meant to or not.

I think what I always want whenever I'm recording is to have even just 2 percent of what the Alabama Shakes have, Brittany Howard.

When I see footage of Guns N' Roses, I see that fu**ing hunger and attitude. You could not f**k with those five guys. It was just raw. It was this lean, hungry thing on its way up. It was as sincere as any rock 'n' roll that I've ever heard, and I'm proud of that.

There's just something really, really timeless about live instruments. There's just something special about them that you can't really duplicate or grasp without including live instruments.

We wanted it more live and raw. We didn't want a studio sound.

I record all of my music with authentic instruments in a studio before we start editing, doing many, many versions. The music shapes the film as we edit so it has an organic relationship to the content.

To be honest with you, I'm not sure what a pop tune is. I'm sure if I hear it on the radio, I'd say that's pop or this or that. But, really, what I pay attention to the most is just music that moves me. It's all at least a root-type music instead of a formula.

I'm not chasing a hit record - that's why I can make a hit record. It's not forced at all; it just happens. It's off of vibes.