Recording Artists Quotes

You can't deny RCA's past and its history. I was also on Capitol Records, so I have that past history.

Ultimately, our goal was to be a band and be recognized for our songs and making records. And I think that has been the case.

I've been blessed because there are a lot of great singers out there that didn't make it past their first album.

Winning a Grammy is always going to be good.

Well, I don't let anyone record with me that is not a fan of mine or believe in my music. Everybody that records for me, from Bob Dylan on down to George Jones, everybody loves me and my music, and I knew they would do their best that they could do, and they did. I didn't doubt them a bit. There's some country people that I wouldn't want, which didn't record with me.

I hear a lot of influence from me and Timbaland's whole sound in a lot of records of today. But if you have classics like that, then I'm sure you gotta expect that it's gonna influence some people. So, I'm fine with that.

I was signed to A&M, I was signed to Lou Adler, who had a company within a company, which was A&M Records, and everything - James Taylor, Rita Coolidge, Carole King - I worked on all of that stuff.

People are quite shocked when you remind them that Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra never wrote a song that they recorded in their lives, as far as I know.

I went to Juilliard in New York and used to do cabarets just for fun. Occasionally, I would get together with a jazz musician and play at a restaurant for cash. And I've done some background vocals for recording artists.

Some artists will tell you that's all they want to do is write their own music, and that's great, but George Strait, Kenny Chesney, Tim McGraw, Garth Brooks, they didn't write everything they recorded, and they've had major, major careers. I think it's all about the best song.

Ah, the Wrecking Crew! They played on everything that came out of L.A. Oh, that was a good band. You really enjoyed going to work. You played for everyone; it didn't matter what it was.

I'm a binge writer. I work in the music business fulltime, in artist management and developing songwriters and recording artists, and so juggling my job I carve out as much time as I can on the weekends.

Nobody considers a covers record an album.

I had been on tour with people like Roy Orbison. I knew Bobby Darin, Sam Cooke. So many great performers.

I really consider myself fortunate to have been of age during the musical revolution that came in the form of the Beatles. People don't realize that previous to the Beatles, there really was no such thing as an album artist. People made singles. Then they would put a bunch of those singles together and call it an album. And that was it.

At the time, the only options were playing the local county fair. Now with American Idol and younger recording artists that have come out, there is more of an opportunity.

It's like every time you have one of these, you're sort of - your lease is renewed another five years. And that's kind of great for me 'cause that's all I really want to be doing still at this point, like just making records and getting to work with, like, artists that I think are exciting.

One of the first groups we signed was the Fifth Dimension.

My earliest memories as a child are listening to Beatles records, and they are a big part of how I've learned to write pop songs.

The Buggles was much more a studio environment idea, which we never actually took on the road.

I've been lucky, because people have done such great versions of my songs, and I've worked with the best singers ever, and I'm lucky that way.

A lot of rappers want somebody to always sing on their records. If you can hold a note, they're gonna' ask you to come and be apart of their creativity. At that time, they were eager and on the streets selling drugs or in the studio making music. That was a big part of our lives were I grew up.

I used to play on Phil Spector's records, and he liked to use three pianists.

There are still recording artists out there doing things for the right reason, but a lot of people seem to be just driven by fame.

When I was 17, my producer Rodney Jerkins was working with Michael Jackson at the time. He knew how much I wanted to meet Michael Jackson, so he says, 'Would you like to come and meet him?' I'm like, 'Are you serious? Of course I want to meet Michael Jackson! Where do I meet you? Where do we come?'