'Never Gonna Give You Up' in 1987 was a huge international hit followed by several more, and while I appreciated how lucky I was, it catapulted me into a completely new world and simply took over my life.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
My biggest song in the world is 'Nothing's Gonna Change My Love for You.' All over the world, it's number one on the whole planet.
One of my first records that I heard was 'Wish You Were Here' by Pink Floyd.
I never gave up on music, and I feel like music never gave up on me.
I was a guy back in the Eighties who was one movie away from a huge career, which at that time didn't happen. In the Nineties, I worked a lot, but it was kind of, 'Get out there and dig and find things.' Then I guess 'The Rookie' and 'Far From Heaven' were referred to as my comeback.
When I came out of service, the first couple of releases didn't really hit so I just took a little hiatus and sat down to see what was happening. I just glued my ears to the radio and then I started writing - the first hit record that came out was 'Everybody Loves a Winner.'
'In A World...' changed my life a thousand per cent. I feel thankful that something I believed in so much - I love dialect, so I dedicated five years of my life to making a film about it - yielded such rewards. It led to 'Man Up,' as well as 'No Escape,' which comes out later this year... two movies where I am the female lead.
In the mid-1980s to the early 1990s I was writing songs not because I particularly liked what I was doing, but because I was desperately trying to get back into the charts. I really didn't enjoy it. I didn't like the music I was making, I wasn't proud of it, like I have been before or since.
Single Record of the Year and New Vocalist were such a blessing to see, but when I saw that I was up for Album of the Year, that's when I started to be like, 'What in the world, this is crazy!' That one really got me in a pretty different way.
My biggest blast-off hit was 'You Raise Me Up.' If you ever have a wedding or a funeral, it's a good pick.
By the late '80s, I was already giving up on rap music.