It's easy to get people to sing along to cover songs, but when it's your song, it's the coolest.
It's not about what hits Billboard or how many views you got on a video. It's about copies sold. It's about streams, you know?
I feel very lucky to get to fly the flag of RCA Records and Sony Music.
When I travel too much, it affects the music, and that is the most important thing. As long as I make good music, I can play shows, but if the music starts getting bad, the show offers won't come.
Record labels and producers are not looking to change you: they are looking to make a star. And what they might think is a star may not be you.
Pantera is a marquee band, with the most diehard fans. We sold over 20 million records without MTV or radio.
I started performing in musical events after the success of 'Victory' and fans demanded the song 'Khaali Quarter' in every show.
My first single I was nominated for a Grammy with 'Crank That,' and I lost a Grammy to Kanye West, but it was still such a big deal for me to be nominated anyway.
I really felt like 'Chandelier' was a big pop song. But we weren't sure what would happen if I wasn't willing to show my face and do promo and go on tour and do the traditional kind of pop strategy. So I had no expectations.
The Righteous Brothers got so heavy because of the dramatic hit records like 'Lovin' Feelin.' Bobby and I just felt like we were a couple of Orange County guys who were just having a great time singing rock n' roll, and then, boy, it became something else.
Good bands won't get famous anymore unless they get really lucky.
Chance The Rapper makes some of the greatest music out, and he build his brand up organically, and the fans have reacted to it.
We were the ones that from the beginning said that 'Wide Open Spaces' was a hit. 'This is a hit, people are going to relate to it.'
When 'I'm Sorry' came out and became such a huge hit, that made 'Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree' start selling. Then that became a huge, huge hit.
I've only had one platinum album, and it's 'Red River Blue'.
I know I'm in the best band in the world.
I have seen more bad songs make it because of MTV than good ones that haven't.
Artists are taught to be humble about their impact, especially in folk music. It's so ingrained that I have a hard time even thinking I had any impact other than what a normal hit song would have.
I've just been fortunate to havehad a lot of hit records, though Human Wheels doesn't qualify as a hit record-but it's really the best single I've ever had.
I don't believe in the philosophy of stumbling across hit records.
Steve Earle had a mainstream career. Dwight Yoakam had a mainstream career. Willie Nelson did. But they always made good music, they always stuck to who they were. They weren't relying on radio like a lot of people are in Nashville.
When I started playing music, people weren't selling 5 million records. That was not the standard; that was not the focus.
I don't want to be oh-so-brag-about-it, but 'The Rain' is hot.
When I'm writing good music and I'm caffeinated, I attribute all my success to the coffee, get really sentimental about the EDM scene and tweet a lot.
I was asked, 'Why do you think the male 'X Factor' winners haven't been successful in the past?' And I said, 'Because obviously the body of work that they've brought out wasn't good enough,' and that was it.
