I love Aretha Franklin, Patti LaBelle, and The Supremes, because I'm kind of old-school at heart.
Guys like Clyde McPhatter used to sing their tail ends off!
I wanted to bring back that big, ballad type of music that we used to love so much. Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, when they first came out, that's what I grew up singing.
My parents were into The Mills Brothers, Perry Como, Ella Fitzgerald, Bing Crosby, Sarah Vaughn, and all those people sung the most wonderful songs - and even when I got into rock 'n' roll, that stayed with me.
When I do listen to music, I'm more prone to listen to the people I've always listened to: George Jones, Otis Redding, Alison Krauss and Emmylou Harris.
I like the Carpenters and Elvis.
I was nostalgic even as a young man. Preferred listening to Opera not Bing Crossby.
I love Aretha Franklin, Edith Piaf, Blondie.
I'm more of an oldies guy. I'll say this - Michael Jackson, best entertainer of all time. Luther Vandross, best male singer of all time. Whitney Houston, best female singer of all time...and when Teddy Pendergrass says turn off the lights, turn 'em off. That's what I got for you.
But me and my sister knew all the Doris Day and Frank Sinatra songs, too.
I would say I grew up listening a lot to Barbra Streisand and Judy Garland and Joan Baez and Joni Mitchell. I grew up listening to those because my parents were kind of into folk music.
I love James Taylor and Carole King, Joni Mitchell - this is, like, early '70s stuff. I love the stuff from the '40s. I love that tight harmony that the studio singers in the '50s would sing. I love Patsy Cline. Yeah, I'm all over the place.
Looking back at those great singers like Gordon MacRae and Howard Keel - they have such a specific kind of style that it seems like we don't really appreciate anymore.
I couldn't get away from the gramophone. It was the only thing that I ever really liked, and I was singing along by the time I was five years old - to the Modernaires and Billie Holiday and Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole.
I love Judy Garland, I love Doris Day, I love Marilyn Monroe. I love everything that comes from that era. The music is just beautiful and powerful - and simple. That's what makes it so great.
My favorites growing up were always Billy Joel, Michael Jackson... and Placido Domingo.
I loved Judy Garland growing up, and I also loved Ella Fitzgerald.
I do - very specifically, I remember Bessie Smith; I used to collect 78 records that I would buy from the St Vincent de Paul store at five cents apiece, and I did this indiscriminately. I would just take whatever was there. And I listened to Patti Page and Walter Huston, 'September Song.'
Some of my other heroes around that time were, oddly enough, Frank Sinatra, Nat Cole and people like that - I was always more inclined to listen to ballads.
I put on the Hank Williams and the Patsy Cline and the Rosemary Clooney on vinyl - I'm not trying to be some cool indie-rock person, I just love the way it sounds - and throw on a T-shirt and jeans. In Texas, we practically come out of the womb in jeans.
