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There are five things to write songs about: I'm leaving you. You're leaving me. I want you. You don't want me. I believe in something. Five subjects, and 12 notes. For all that, we musicians do pretty well.
Elvis Costello
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Elvis Costello
Age: 69
Born: 1955
Born: August 25
Composer
Guitarist
Record Producer
Singer-Songwriter
London
England
Declan Patrick MacManus
Declan Patrick Aloysius MacManus
Declan MacManus
Music
Leaving
Wells
Musician
Well
Songs
Writing
Subjects
Something
Pretty
Believe
Five
Things
Song
Musicians
Write
Notes
More quotes by Elvis Costello
There's so many people to see. So many people to check up on and add to your collection.
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I woke up and one of us was crying.
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And over the last ten years, after my work with the Brodsky Quartet, I had the opportunity to write arrangements for chamber group, chamber orchestra, jazz orchestra, symphony orchestra even.
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You need a platform upon which to release an orchestral record, otherwise it's just going to be an obscurity.
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It's not crazy to want to have certain songs be developed harmonically and still want to make noise with the guitar. And you can have both.
Elvis Costello
I became an altar boy because of the solemn face, but I got thrown out at fourteen for laughing. Because the priest used to mumble everything except the church plate takings.
Elvis Costello
When they finally put you in the ground, I'll stand on your grave and tramp the dirt down.
Elvis Costello
[Commercial radio] is owned by one or two corporations now, and they're not in the music business. They're in the advertising business.... So let's not kid ourselves. If you want to hear music, go buy a guitar.
Elvis Costello
Smokey Robinson writes the heartfelt songs, whereas it was my job to write the songs about weakness and failure in love.
Elvis Costello
When you work with new people, I think that it throws all of the matters into relief, because you have to explain yourself every time. It's like crossing a new border. They want to see your documents.
Elvis Costello
It's what I do. I don't deserve any awards for this, it's just music. It's just writing songs. You sit down, you write a song, you record it. You tour and play the songs live, dress them up a bit differently, or dress them down.
Elvis Costello
Sometimes I write notes that I have difficulty singing.
Elvis Costello
Don't tell me you don't know what love is When you're old enough to know better.
Elvis Costello
I started with rock n' roll and...then you start to take it apart like a child with a toy and you see there's blues and there's country...Then you go back from country into American music...and you end up in Scotland and Ireland eventually.
Elvis Costello
My ultimate vocation in life is to be an irritant, someone who disrupts the daily drag of life just enough to leave the victim thinking there's maybe more to it all than the mere hum-drum quality of existence.
Elvis Costello
I believe that music is connected by human passions and curiosities rather than by marketing strategies.
Elvis Costello
I've always felt writing a song was a bit like going on location. That's true in an almost literal sense. Where you are seeps in somehow.
Elvis Costello
Writing about music is like dancing about architecture - it's really a stupid thing to want to do.
Elvis Costello
Morrissey writes wonderful song titles, but sadly he often forgets to write the song.
Elvis Costello
You're drinking vintage Elvis Presley wine.
Elvis Costello