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I think it is your job as an artist to be able to hear a song.

As a songwriter, I feel like, just for inspiration and research purposes, I have to listen to everything.

Artists who write songs... what they're going through usually comes through in their music.

Everything I do, whether it's producing or signing an artist, always starts with the songs. When I'm listening, I'm looking for a balance that you could see in anything. Whether it's a great painting or a building or a sunset.

A musician's whole life is to listen.

Naturally, no one knows more about music than musicians. They talk about their own work all the time, but they rarely get to talk about other people's music.

Most artists, you know, you spend their entire lives learning how to play music and write songs, and they don't really know how the music business works.

I've always gone into the studio with a very clear understanding of a song, of the words or, if it's an instrumental piece, of the melodies, and that never changes.

Some songs you get. Some songs you may not. And I think that's the beauty of art: to question and to ask, to understand the deeper meaning after two or three or four listenings.