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You start to become successful, and everybody starts to drive your money train to the bank, and they're not thinking anymore about what you want as an artist or if any of that even matters to you. It genuinely upsets people in my life that I don't care about money, and that's not my problem.

Any time you're stepping out on a limb as an artist, it's scary, especially when you have a lot of success. When you're reaching a lot of people, the masses, it's easy to stay in that niche, you know? Especially when you're making a lot of money and you know there's a formula, it's easy to stay in that rut.

I'm very new to the industry. I'm not on the Billboard 200 and that is alarming to me. But when I sat down with my management they said it's not a big deal and that it happens all the time.

If you're an artist, it's great to have a knowledge of the business and be educated about that, but you've got to keep the balance right between business and artistry; otherwise, you get cynical.

It's like half the campaign of selling a record is trying to convince people that you're an artist. Well, I am an artist. This is what I do.

Every now and then, I feel terribly uncomfortable with what I'm working on, and then I think maybe I am an artist. I'm not very articulate about it, but I do know that you have to follow your gut.

Artists are notoriously snooty and suspicious of anything coming from the business community.

You can't fool yourself anymore that your art is your art. When you're not getting paid for that song that's being traded back and forth among millions of people on the Internet, you have to think like a businessperson.