Vocals Only Quotes & Sayings

I played guitar and bass. I didn't do much vocals, although I did have one band where I was the lead singer. But that was when I was in college. — Oscar Isaac

When we talk about my music, it's a cross between Tina Turner, Alanis Morrisette, and Diana Ross. It's the glamour and the showiness of Diana Ross; the ferociousness and pain of Tina Turner; and the vocals of Alanis. — Wynter Gordon

I do most of my vocals - aside from a couple of little one-shot vocal samples. I record everything into the Saffire with an SM58 then scratch it with loads of plug-ins. I don't do much vocoding to be honest. All my vocals are usually done with Melodyne and a ton of other plug-ins to make it sound weird. — Skrillex

The soothing vocals of "Ave Maria" serenaded from the small speaker, and Austin looked at me and shrugged in embarrassment. "It makes her smile," was all he said. I lost a piece of my heart to him right then. — Tillie Cole

I can remember the first time I ever recorded my vocals on to a beat. Cat Coore from Third World - a legendary Jamaican band - had a little demo set up at his house. I'm very good friends with his eldest son, Shiah, who plays with me now. So we were rhyming over a track by the dancehall artist Peter Metro. I've still got it somewhere. — Damian Marley

I'm obsessed with choirs, and always have been, because of that sense of overwhelming vocals. — Florence Welch

I can draw with sound. That's the most useful thing I learned in terms of what my craft is ... The arrangements were mine. They were little lines and stuff that I had written myself ... And I was locked into this idea that vocals didn't count, melodies didn't count, songwriting craftsmanship didn't count. The only thing that counted was high arching guitar solos. — Linda Ronstadt

In hip hop, it's a lot more about lacing a hot track. I start it, I help mix it, I help write it, I help produce it, I cut the person's vocals. I'm involved from the beginning to the end of a song. I'm not just giving someone a beat, you know? — Benny Blanco

There's not a day that I don't work on vocals, have vocal coaches, go to acting classes, read books. — Aaron Carter

The original vocals had an awful lot of work put into them at the time, and I wasn't really sure that I could better them - I don't know if I have bettered them. — Kate Bush

When you've got insane drums and a lot of guitar, it's really hard to mix the vocals, to mix it all well. — Marnie Stern

The boarders have changed. My vocals explore different elements and you know it was really important for me to transfer the atmosphere of the songs with my voice. — Heather Nova

I'm tired of being around men all the time. I'm going to start a band called Skirt with three girls and I'll play the guitar and sing backing vocals in drag. I went window shopping when I was in New York, saw a lot of amazing dresses. — Brian Molko

For any producer I've ever worked with, their toughest job is to convince me to not to obscure my vocals. A lot of people don't like the sound of their own voice on, like, cassette tape or something. It's like that for me, and other songwriters I know. Like, "Oh God, that's what I sound like?" — Ryan Adams

The only time it dominates is during a solo, or when we play a low blues and I put figures in behind Eric's vocals. There's never any real problem fitting guitar and organ together. — Alan Price

[The Real Thing]
But when it came time to Patton to lay down his vocals, Wallace was surprised to hear that Patton had opted to utilize a peculiar singing voice. Wallace: He was singing really nasally and also, his pitch on record was not as good as I knew it could be. I was just like, 'Why don't you just hit the notes?' And he goes, 'No man, this is my style.' Because he'd sing the song on tape, and he'd do this amazing, really full voice. I'm like, 'That's the voice! Get that on the darn tape!' He was like, 'No man, I don't want to do it'. — Greg Prato

The vocal arrangements are a big part of the formula for a Bad Religion song - layered harmonies and background vocals. So when I start to describe the elements of Bad Religion's sound, it starts to sound like a Christmas choir. — Greg Graffin

Suffice to say that the TG2, Germ pre and EQ, and TG1 are there anytime I track drums, TG2 for guitars and the LTD-1 is there whenever I do vocals! — Billy Bush

I used to do more melodic stuff, and I used to do more actual rap - like traditional hip hop vocals. I think my method of storytelling has led me to this point, at which I want to pare down my style. I think I give the lyrics more thought, and then when I try to perform the lyrics over the track I'll try it over and over again, and eventually the lyrics will sink into the track by the way I project them. — Galcher Lustwerk

All my vocals were recorded at home, which was great for me. You can actually have a studio in a computer program called ProTools. I did half the record with ProTools. — David Coverdale

I write the vocals last, because I wanted to invent the music first and push the music to the level that I had to compete against it. — Axl Rose

There's not a whole lot to do in Athens. When I was 13, I just started entertaining myself by writing songs. I'd sit in my room for 10 hours playing the same song, stacking vocals, trying out different drum beats, realizing no one would ever hear this but having so much fun. I guess I got my voice from just doing that so often. — Brittany Howard

After 10 years, I have been touring for 20, playing basically the same type of music, a four-piece or three-piece type of music with loud, crashing drums and screaming vocals. It gets to the point where you're looking for something new, and you don't want to do something that's way too left-field, for fear that it might seem contrived. — Dave Grohl

Private listening really took off in 1979, with the popularity of the Walkman portable cassette player. Listening to music on a Walkman is a variation of the "sitting very still in a concert hall" experience (there are no acoustic distractions), combined with the virtual space (achieved by adding reverb and echo to the vocals and instruments) that studio recording allows. With headphones on, you can hear and appreciate extreme detail and subtlety, and the lack of uncontrollable reverb inherent in hearing music in a live room means that rhythmic material survives beautifully and completely intact; it doesn't get blurred or turned into sonic mush as it often does in a concert hall. You, and only you, the audience of one, can hear a million tiny details, even with the compression that MP3 technology adds to recordings. You can hear the singer's breath intake, their fingers on a guitar string. That said, extreme and sudden dynamic changes can be painful on a personal music player. As — David Byrne

There are a lot of people using technology that are playing to a click with backing vocals already stuck in there on some computerized thing that runs along in time to the show so they have these amazing vocals that are only partly the guys on stage producing them at the time. — James Young

We were gradually playing larger venues and in the early days PA systems were kind of non-existent. So to play loud, we had to use louder equipment. The PA systems back then didn't mic the instruments - only the vocals. — John Entwistle

The only rumors worth listening to have Stevie Nicks on vocals. — Chris Jericho

What we look for when we need to find someone who can fit in with our music, the vocals and the harmonies and the way they blend are very important to us because if you listen to Beach Boys music, the harmonies, not only are the notes being sung, but there's a blend to it. The voices have to blend. — Mike Love

Inside, upstairs, where the planes are met, the spaces are long and low and lined in tasteful felt gray like that cocky stewardess's cap and filled with the kind of music you become aware of only when the elevator stops or when the dentist stops drilling. Plucked strings, no vocals, music that's used to being ignored, a kind of carpet in the air, to cover up a silence that might remind you of death. — John Updike

As far as favorite 'overall package' record of all time, I'd have to say 'My Girl' by The Temptations. I like everything about it, not only the composition - but the arrangement, the production, the lead vocals, the background vocals, the horns, the strings. That one I listen to over and over again. — Paul Shaffer

That was an idea of the record company, and also that was my first album after MCA and we wanted to come back with a strong album that would be noticed. If we put the vocals by very talented people and very meaningful songs, then the vocals would be a platform so that I could be noticed again. All of the MCA albums were just loaded with problems
you know, the right musicians, the engineers. The record company would say 'You have to make music for black radio, you can't do what you have been doing with The Crusaders.' Everybody was telling me that was over, finished, done. — Joe Sample

I could always hold a melody, but I was never like, I'm going to be a singer. So I'm able to use that when I write. I'm actually playing the beat with my voice. Instead of thinking about coming up with melodies, it's like filling in the instruments. So sometimes it's better to have beats with less melodies in them, because then I can play more with my vocals. — Kid Ink

I like adding little elements into the final mix. I'm more fond of the '70s glam than '80s. I have that style of vocals ... there are a lot of pop artists who are using the glam vibe in their music. I'm part of that wave. — Adam Lambert

After so many years of whispery, DIY vocals, there's this new generation of voices that are really starting to burst through the seams. — Zach Condon

It's just a lot of fun to be able to see your ideas come into fruition. And to see people translate the things that come out of my mind vocally. And to be able to produce vocals and give people my point of view musically. And to be able to sit in the crowd and see people sing the song that I wrote, it's an amazing feeling. — Rico Love

I feel like vocals are to music what portraits are to painting. They're the humanity. Landscapes are good and fine, but at the end of the day everyone loves the Mona Lisa. — Grimes

Background vocals during her song "I Hope You Dance" ... 'Time is a wheel in constant motion always, rolling us along. Tell me who wants to look back on their years and wonder, where those years have gone.' — Lee Ann Womack

I pay such close attention of the record making process that most people would assume are very little and wouldn't be that big of a deal; the packaging, the title, and the harmonies, I think, are arguably as important as the lead vocals. — David Nail

Sometimes silence become the most excruciating sound; sometimes the mind becomes a musical symphony of clouded thoughts, questions and clarifications but the vocals fail to present the sound of conversation. — Sumrit Shahi

My vocals are bad, I can't sing, hey man, I wouldn't ask you to do a drum roll if your arm was falling off. — James Hetfield

You want to hear vocals? Go sing it. — James Hetfield

I usually prepare a track and then I work with the artist when it's time to do the vocals. — Kenneth Edmonds

There's Eddie's conviction and his lyrics and his ideals, and he can just rock straight out. His vocals are incredible. And we all are really competent musicians. — Mike McCready

There's a few times in the past when I wrote a song, and I put the words together, and they were very clear pictures, and I felt like I was putting together a really good story. But I don't think I was ever really able to stay on that. What I've sort of developed lyrically is more about the sound of the vocals and what they are. — Justin Vernon

The irony is that I don't think we took a step backwards to make 'Group Therapy'. I think we took a step forward because it's a lot more complicated to make that kind of album. I think that album was far more produced than 'American Apathy', and it had a lot more harmony vocals and lots of intricate parts musically speaking. — Brian Ebejer

It's fun singing with other people who are really good singers. There's something kind of poignant about braiding a couple vocals. — Eddie Vedder

Upwell is one of the most terrifyingly great bands I have ever known out of Seattle. Their musicianship and songwriting is monstrous ... They're heavy like Soundgarden or Zeppelin with killer female vocals, but with their own unique style. — Jack Endino

I actually produced other people's vocals for a long time when I first signed my publishing deal and I had just sort of decided that I only wanted to be a writer. I would be in all of these writing sessions, and a lot of times my publisher would say, "You should get a demo singer to sing it because then it doesn't identify as a Solange song." — Solange Knowles

It was way out in the woods in a beautiful, huge log studio. Keith Richards came in and did the vocals with Levon. Again, a big party, but we did get a good cut out of it. — Scotty Moore

I could definitely rock out to Kraftwerk's "Tour De France," Tubeway Army, or Gary Numan. All of that stuff has an infectious beat, but with "Oh Yeah," I can't even identify what's going on. It sounds like typewriter keys, a couple of synth notes and then this really deep "Oh yeah," which I always picture as Andre The Giant on vocals. — Margaret Cho