Lenny Kravitz Quotes & Sayings

I just feel so good; it feels like a very creative time for me. As far as my mind, spirit, and body, I've never felt better. — Lenny Kravitz

Eventually you're going to have a digital transfer anyway when you make a CD, so it doesn't matter as long as what you're hitting first is what you want it to be. — Lenny Kravitz

If you heard my records and no one told you, I don't think you'd know whether it's a band or one guy. — Lenny Kravitz

You've got your entourage and people that help you make whatever happen around you. Everything's crazy and you're not paying attention to your inner feelings because you're so busy. I couldn't take it. — Lenny Kravitz

Music is my life, it is a reflection of what I go through. — Lenny Kravitz

I mean, look at the people we celebrate - a lot of people who really don't do anything. They just walk the red carpets and go to all the parties, and they're hooked up with the right people, so they're celebrities. But what for? — Lenny Kravitz

Nine out of ten groups that came out in '89 are gone. I'm still here. — Lenny Kravitz

I was always talking about peace and love, even when I was a kid. That's how I grew up in my family. — Lenny Kravitz

I found it a really refreshing change of pace to suddenly be completely directed. It was a type of collaboration that I don't normally have. — Lenny Kravitz

A lot of my songs deal with spirituality and God, and I guess if you're in tune with that, you'll read into it. — Lenny Kravitz

My mother always told me to embrace both sides of my background. And she also taught me one very useful thing when I was going to first grade. She said, "You're Bahamian and African-American on one side, and Russian-Jewish on the other. You're no more one than the other, and it's beautiful that you have all this. It makes your life all the more rich. But society will see you only as black." — Lenny Kravitz

There are so many people that don't believe in themselves and don't have faith. — Lenny Kravitz

I want to do interiors, furniture. I want to do architecture, although I'm not an architect. Nor am I a trained interior designer. — Lenny Kravitz

A lot of people don't listen to the lyrics, really. — Lenny Kravitz

I wouldn't play together with someone who likes to control everything like me. — Lenny Kravitz

I wasn't the kind of person that liked waiting for autographs or following them, I just liked to go to the shows, study their records, driving many, many hours to different states to go to concerts. — Lenny Kravitz

I am not trying to change the world. I am just offering my gift that God gave me, and if somebody is moved by it, that's beautiful. — Lenny Kravitz

We're beginning to play God and get into cloning. We give up quickly. Divorce is an easy option. So why not just create your own mate? Synthesize a human being. You get tired of it, turn it off and put it in the closet like the vacuum cleaner. — Lenny Kravitz

At first people thought I was really arrogant and a snob about music because I'm so intense about my production and sound, and because they knew I didn't like new music so much. — Lenny Kravitz

I am still into the people I listened to growing up, so I completely remember what is like to be a fan, I haven't changed. — Lenny Kravitz

I identify with women more than men. I guess I have a strong feminine side. — Lenny Kravitz

You can't even sing or play an instrument, so you just scream instead. You're living for an image, so you got five hundred women in your bed. — Lenny Kravitz

I'm experiencing the mood to go out and share the music. I don't look at these concerts as a platform for people to watch me, look at me. No, a tour is about an interaction. A thing, myself, a band, and the people who support what I do and enjoy what I do. — Lenny Kravitz

I knew what I wanted to do from the time I was 5. — Lenny Kravitz

A dramatic thing, the first time you stand up to your dad. — Lenny Kravitz

So that's why you've got to try, you got to breath and have some fun. Though I'm not paid, I play this game, and I won't stop until I'm done. But what I really want to know is - Are you gonna go my way? — Lenny Kravitz

I am trying to get closer to God. — Lenny Kravitz

When I stopped trying to write songs, that's when I'm able to begin writing songs. You have to just use your life, and the things around you for your inspiration. — Lenny Kravitz

Love , creativity, and opportunity is in the air. Take it in and do your thing. — Lenny Kravitz

If you go to Japan, they're still buying vinyl, and they want the education. They know who's playing on what tracks from the '60s and the '70s - who the guitar player is, who the drummer is, who the producer was, what studio it was recorded in. That's how I grew up listening to music. We bought albums. We read the liner notes. It was important to know the whole history behind it. — Lenny Kravitz

God gave me the gift to be able to play instruments and I have to play. — Lenny Kravitz

Things that would shock us years ago are like nothing now. — Lenny Kravitz

I basically camped out for a year and a half in an Airstream trailer on the beach out in front of the studio. I had no idea what I was gonna do, what kind of album I was gonna make - all I knew was that I wanted to sit there and just take in whatever came. — Lenny Kravitz

I'm sure great scripts are hard to find, but I'm definitely open, and waiting to see what comes my way. — Lenny Kravitz

What motivates it is life. Life is everything. Life influences my music and brings it forth. Life is always changing, so I'm always hearing new music. — Lenny Kravitz

(On being asked if he preferred to be a rock god or sex god) I am neither. My favourite role is father. — Lenny Kravitz

They think I'm being serious when actually I'm a very big clown. But you have to know me to see that. I'm constantly cracking up and cracking everybody else around me up. — Lenny Kravitz

Me being in my grandmother's yard in Brooklyn. I must have been about 3. I had this red balloon. I let go of it, and it went up into the sky and just kept going and going. I completely flipped out, because I didn't understand why. — Lenny Kravitz

I've always been into films. I've been offered lots of films but they've always been these very stereotypical roles. They wanted me to play some gangster or street guy, or pimp, drug addict. — Lenny Kravitz

When it comes to acting, it's about creating a character and bringing forth a director's vision. It's a weird feeling, because with acting, it's just not about me. I love being in that position, because with the music, it's always about me. — Lenny Kravitz

I mean, there are only so many notes. What makes something original is how you put it together. — Lenny Kravitz

I always try to keep the circumstances in my life fresh. I like to change the physical environment I live in, change the people around me and try to experience things for the first time. I think that keeps one on their toes, creatively and spiritually. — Lenny Kravitz

The idea of having to conform to someone else's ideal is unacceptable. I'm gonna be me. And if I can't be me, then I'd rather not do it. — Lenny Kravitz

Fly Away changed my life. There are certain songs that do. When I won the Grammy, I was in Paris. I sort of forgot about it. — Lenny Kravitz

Change is growth. For me it has been a very spiritual and musical rebirth. — Lenny Kravitz

When I hear music, it's visual; I see things, — Lenny Kravitz

I was an actor when I was a teenager and it could have been the direction that I headed in. But music and my relationship with music is quite deep, and it really is the nucleus of my creativity. So I gave up acting so I could pursue music fully, and I never thought about really going back. And then [director] Lee Daniels met me and wanted to work with me, and that's how it started. — Lenny Kravitz

When I was a kid and I bought a record, I ripped that thing open, I wanted to know who was playing what, what studio it was cut at, who was the string arranger, who was the engineer. — Lenny Kravitz

I never sit down to write or say, "Today, I have to record something." I wait to hear it and then I go for it. — Lenny Kravitz

I couldn't tell you what I am going to do next 'cause I have no idea, but I am open to anything. — Lenny Kravitz

People see my photos and think I labor over my image and I'm this cool, brooding artist. But I'm just having fun with it. — Lenny Kravitz

For the last few years, it's been so chic for everybody to be miserable. Like if you're in with the cool crowd, you can't be happy. — Lenny Kravitz

Let's look at human interactions. I really believe that there is a way for us to settle disputes nonviolently, using our minds, using all of that was given to us. — Lenny Kravitz

My mother passed at the end of the Circus tour. After that I really needed to take some time and just chill out and get my head together. — Lenny Kravitz

I'm sure at one point I will do some acting again, but it would have to be the right thing. I'm not going to do it just because people are offering it to me. Not for those box-office, bullshit, money, noncreative people. But I'll do it when it's right to do it. — Lenny Kravitz

My mother's side of the family is from the Bahamas, and I spent time there on and off when I was growing up. It's the place where I feel at peace. — Lenny Kravitz

I don't think about the styles. I write whatever comes out and I use whatever kind of instrumentation works for those songs. — Lenny Kravitz

If you ask a hundred people, they all give you different answers. — Lenny Kravitz

When I'm in the studio, I write the music, I play the different instruments, I produce it, I arrange it, and it's a self-indulgent exercise. It's the way I make my music. And when I'm acting, I get to leave myself behind, which is a relief. I get to collaborate with a director; I respect the director's medium and all the actors and actresses. So at the end of the day, it's about a character and it's about a director's vision. It's a really good balance for being so intense and alone in my personal process of making music. — Lenny Kravitz

God is love and if you are ready, he always is. — Lenny Kravitz

It doesn't take a lot to get me motivated. I'm a studio rat. When I was in high school and I would walk into a recording studio, it felt like this magical place, this temple, this womb that I could escape into. — Lenny Kravitz

A lot of people pretty much only listen to the chorus. — Lenny Kravitz

I get a lot of joy from playing instruments, and I have a different personality on each instrument. I like to let that come out. I get kind of selfish. — Lenny Kravitz

At 10 o'clock in the morning I'd go right in the studio. It feels good to be there in the morning before the day starts to mess with you - I don't mean in a negative way, but before I'd speak to a lot of people or get into anything, I'd go in there and just see what I felt. A lot happens in the morning for me in the studio. — Lenny Kravitz

There's certain things in life that I love. One is architecture. And music, culture, food, people. New Orleans has all of that. — Lenny Kravitz

It's a trip to have a Greatest Hits record. It's a trip. — Lenny Kravitz

None of those material possessions do anything to make your life any better ... I know a lot of people who have a lot of everything, and they're absolutely the most miserable people in the world. So it won't do anything for you unless you're a happy person and can have peace with yourself. — Lenny Kravitz

Working with Gabby [Sidibe], I realized immediately that she was amazingly talented. I could tell just by the way she'd get into the role. — Lenny Kravitz

It was amazing to me that, all of a sudden, I was hearing my music on the radio and coming out of cars. — Lenny Kravitz

I'm very much about the environment, I'm very much about health, about being able to, at the very least, eat organic, whole foods that are healthy for us. And then, of course, everyone being able to eat and at least have a humane way to live. There's enough for everybody, but unfortunately, there's a lot of greed and a lot of ego. — Lenny Kravitz

I find cooking to be the one thing that relaxes me. I don't get to do it often ... — Lenny Kravitz

I really didn't know a lot of rock 'n' roll until I moved to L.A. Before that, when I was in New York, I grew up listening mostly to R&B and soul and jazz. — Lenny Kravitz

Every night is different, you never know what it's going to be like. I remember every night. I don't like to compare them. — Lenny Kravitz

I don't like to approach people that much. There's been times when I wanted to say something to somebody, in a quick moment, but didn't. Then you think, man, who knows? — Lenny Kravitz

The story that I wanna tell is pretty much about the way I grew up. Being bi-racial, growing up in a big city and being an artist. — Lenny Kravitz

I was in Paris last year, where there's a great appreciation of many different aspects of African culture and of black culture. The music ... the art ... whatever ... And I kind of went with that. — Lenny Kravitz

One musician listens to another musician, and you get inspired and then you do your thing, but it's yours. — Lenny Kravitz

Life, the moment. Where the magic is. That's what really keeps me motivated, alive, hungry. I'm still as excited and motivated now as I was twenty-five years ago, and that's because I really live for those moments. And that's where the art comes from, that's where the music is born, that's where it all appears. I love it. — Lenny Kravitz

The loyalty rate isn't that high. I could have a big hit, then put out the next single, and they say, Oh yeah, who are you? Prove it again. — Lenny Kravitz

My first guitar, a Fender Jazz Master, I traded it in for a Les Paul Deluxe. — Lenny Kravitz

We should take time out to really love; we should take time out to find out who we are. — Lenny Kravitz

We're getting so pulled in by computers and technology, and our kids have their face in the computers all day. The human relationship is being diminished by this. — Lenny Kravitz

I always read the Capitol as f - ked up pansexuality, everybody is doing everybody. Back to Greek and Roman times! It's all happening. — Lenny Kravitz

The fans of 'The Hunger Games,' of the book, are very passionate. It's funny: Even at my concerts there are people holding up 'Cinna' signs. — Lenny Kravitz

I'm in this for the long haul. I've been making music my whole life. — Lenny Kravitz

Jimi Hendrix was just so fluid. His hands were connected to his soul, you know? His playing was just so emotional. You could feel the fire, you could feel the blues. You could feel the sadness. It's unbelievable. — Lenny Kravitz

The way I was raised and the people that I grew up around for the most part were very humble people, and I appreciate all that they taught me, and their energy and their magnanimity help keep me grounded. — Lenny Kravitz

Where I'm at in life, the women have got to come with something else, not just the body, but the mind and spirit. It usually trips them out, but that's the way it's going to be. I'm looking at the big picture. — Lenny Kravitz

There's definitely an old school element to my music, but I also think it's modern. — Lenny Kravitz

I just live my life and try to be present. — Lenny Kravitz

I went to Paris in 1989 when the Americans didn't quite know what to do with me at first. Now, all those years later, it's kind of the same story. Not the same scenario, but kind of the same story. — Lenny Kravitz

Mothers love you to the end, and she didn't want to hold me back from my livelihood. So I left for a month and called her every couple of days. I came home and she died 24 hours later. — Lenny Kravitz

I'm just as white as I am black, and I'm just as Russian Jew as I am West Indian. — Lenny Kravitz

If you listen to a lot of old funk records, the drums are really small. But you don't perceive it like that because the groove is so heavy. — Lenny Kravitz

When I'm making my music, I'm writing it, I'm producing it, I'm playing all the instruments, I'm performing. It's my own world where I do what I feel, and nobody tells me anything. — Lenny Kravitz

I enjoy what people at the concert give me and I can't do it without them, so it's really an exchange of energy that snowballs back and forth and becomes something that's very satisfying and very magical. — Lenny Kravitz

I think it'd be a real nightmare to put a record out and sell 20 million copies and then that's it. — Lenny Kravitz

I've had to work very hard, and I don't really have a category or fit into any niche, so each time I come out with a new record, it's like, I'm a new guy. — Lenny Kravitz

Today, people are more into the glitz and the glamour of everything. We don't even read the inside of records anymore. — Lenny Kravitz

People feel they have to live that stereotypical lifestyle in order to be a rock star. You don't have to shoot heroin and act a certain way to be a rock and roll musician. — Lenny Kravitz