John Oates Quotes

The key, I think, from a business point of view, is to learn how to be efficient in making a record that's not too expensive, so that you're not going crazy spending tons of money making a product that might not ever return that money.

The mustache represented the old John; I didn't want to be that guy anymore, so I shaved it off. It was ritualistic in a way.

I think people were just starving for good material because they just weren't getting it on the radio.

I was born at the beginning of rock and roll. I got to experience the entire evolution of popular rock and roll music even before it started.

We've been together since we've been teenagers. I can go away and disappear for two years, and when we get back together, it's like nothing ever has changed.

When the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame decided to open up the voting beyond their inner circle, to the actual fans, that's when I think everything changed.

My songwriting has evolved, just as I've evolved as a person.

I think it's kind of difficult to write a good Christmas song because you have a narrow framework of references that you have to work within, and at the same time you want to do something that's personally original and hopefully somewhat unique.

In our relationship, we don't have that situation. I don't require what he needs, and he doesn't require what I need. I know what I do; I have an amazing life that nobody knows about.

I'm bad at math.

Dick Clark's 'American Bandstand' spread the gospel of American pop music and teenage style that transcended the regional boundaries of our country and united a youth culture that eventually spread its message throughout the entire world.

There's always a personal satisfaction in writing a song by yourself. You get the inspiration, and see it through, and you're done. It's focused and very personal.

It's the music that brings us together.

I didn't come to Nashville to put on a cowboy hat and pretend to be a country singer. My attraction to Nashville as Music City is the variety and flexibility: the fact that there's so many musicians at your disposal, so many amazing studios and talented people that you can draw from ... I try to be myself, but at the same time I'm learning a lot, and I'm pulling from not only from the well of inspiration that I'm getting from Nashville, but I'm pulling from my roots.

We should have an easier name to pronounce.

There's all sorts of soul. There's Irish soul and Native American soul. If it touches you and moves you, it's soul.

I'm an indie artist with major distribution, so one foot in the extreme major music business and one foot in the abyss of indie artists.

With his passing, Dick Clark deserves to take his place at the top in the pantheon of popular culture icons.

I just like playing with the band and doing what I do.

I love what Alabama Shakes is doing - it's kind of like what grunge did to rock 'n' roll, they're doing to R&B.

I realized if I'm not really making an album, I don't have to be concerned about things like stylistic consistency, pacing, a coherent mood. All that stuff goes out the window.

The Katy Perry stuff, those are great songs.

We collaborate together. We work with other people. We work by ourselves.

I sense people respond more to the honest approach to making music instead of the manufactured approach.

I like playing on stage, don't get me wrong.

When I graduated from college in the spring of 1970, I decided to hitchhike around Europe with my guitar and my backpack. I was gone for about four months.

I don't listen to music. I very rarely listen to music. I only listen for information. I listen when a friend sends me a song or a new record.

I'd like to do something with the Avett Brothers.

I couldn't wait to grow a mustache. I stopped shaving my upper lip the day I graduated from high school.

You may be embarrassed about the way you looked and the wacky clothes you wore when you were young, but normally, at least it's hidden in a box in the attic.

The world has accelerated to the point that, as far as the album as a form, I don't know if it's going to last that much longer.

If anyone looks back to the '70s, '80s with nostalgic rosy colored glasses and goes, 'Well, everything was awesome.' No, everything was not awesome!

I was just glad to meet somebody outside of my group of small town friends who was into music. Somebody else who had aspirations to do something more than sing at a record hop.

I think in music and a lot of creative fields, people's egos get in the way of their ability of seeing the big picture.

Back in the early '90s, I started going to Nashville to do a lot of co-writes. One of the first people I met there was Keith Follese. Keith and his wife Adrienne are both songwriters, and we wrote some songs together.

The first record I bought myself could have been 'Oh Lonesome Me' by Don Gibson or 'Wake Up Little Susie' by the Everly Brothers.

The Christmas genre is a field that's been well-ploughed.

My guitar playing is a synthesis of traditional American acoustic style and Urban Pop and R&B.

There isn't one album that says 'Hall & Oates.' It's always 'Daryl Hall and John Oates.' From the very beginning. People never note that. The idea of 'Hall & Oates,' this two-headed monster, this thing, is not anything we've ever wanted or liked.

The decline of the major labels has changed the audience. They aren't force-fed by a system any more. They can make their own decisions.

Well, before we met I had heard and seen him sing so I knew he was good.

You don't want to pitch a tent and live inside the Louvre. You want to check it out, appreciate it, and move somewhere else.

Jam Cruise is actually a comfortable place for me. My jamming skills and my improvisational skills have improved immensely as I've gone more solo, because I've had this opportunity.

If you look over the years, the styles have changed - the clothes, the hair, the production, the approach to the songs. The icing to the cake has changed flavors. But if you really look at the cake itself, it's really the same.

Americana Music is about all sorts of different music. It's very free and open: a world where people just like authentic music.

I get to play with all these different players who don't necessarily approach music always the same way that I might. So I learn a lot.

I couldn't begin to name names ... in general I have found racers to be some of the most competitive people on the planet ... and some of the nicest as well.

My mustache has become this weird iconic representation of a certain era.

I was singing when I was two years old, and my parents were very supportive, but they weren't musicians themselves.

When my song came on the radio for the first time, that was one of the heaviest things I remember.

Young people go to concerts.

I have a lot of friends who are involved in everything from Americana to blues to R&B to pop to country.

You have to know when to strike and when to retreat.

I wish I could see over crowds and small groups of people.

I may just keep releasing singles 'til I run out of music, which is kind of cool in a way - as long as people don't go, 'Oh my God, not another one!'

When albums gave way to CDs, people re-discovered their collection through their CDs.

I don't care if it's a Cole Porter song, or George Gershwin, or Lennon/McCartney, or Elton John, or you know, whoever, Bob Dylan. Great songs are great songs, and they stand the test of time, and they can be interpreted and recorded with many points of view, but yet still retain the essence of what makes them good songs.

You don't wanna be around your family constantly.

There's a lot of craft in songwriting. The divine inspiration is when the idea comes. It may be a riff. It may be a word. It may be a phrase. It may be a title. Sometimes, in the best of both worlds, that divine inspiration extends through the whole song. I've literally sat down and written a song from beginning to end, almost complete lyrics and everything without ever stopping ... in two minutes. The chorus of 'She's Gone' was like that..