Quote

I no longer know the author of this book, for simply stopping long enough and writing it down was where I changed from a boy with his eyes squeezed shut to a man with his eyes wide open so that the sunlight might reach my heart despite all that darkness.

Ryan Adams

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Ryan Adams
Age: 50
Born: 1974
Born: November 5
Guitarist
Musician
Singer
Singer-Songwriter
Songwriter
Jacksonville
North Carolina
David Ryan Adams
Men
Eyes
Wide
Eye
Reach
Might
Darkness
Squeezed
Book
Longer
Stopping
Enough
Boys
Sunlight
Writing
Changed
Author
Heart
Simply
Shut
Long
Open
Despite

More quotes by Ryan Adams

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A lot of the songs I write are like songs that I've never been able to find on any record, but that I've always wanted to hear. Or maybe in a style I already loved, but I was looking for something in it that I wasn't hearing yet.
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This is going to sound crazy, but I can hear music in my head. I can imagine a piano or a guitar playing, and I can sort of think out.
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You can imagine several scenes from Star Wars? The way they looked? For me, that's how music is. Sometimes I'll be developing riffs for songs, just while I'm sitting around and not playing.
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To conceive music, to execute it in front of others, to make it so others can do it...it can be pretty humbling, and kind of scary. So yeah, I don't really feel in competition with anybody. Not because I feel elitist, but because I have enough self-competition. I'm always struggling.
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I think that music, or at least the kind of music that I make, benefits greatly from improvisation.
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When I start working on a batch of tunes - like roughly 10 solid tunes - I always know there'll be another 10 to follow, because for every song I invest a lot of time in, there's another song waiting behind it.
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A lot of my songs, they're like puzzle pieces, and there's just one way to put them together. You could, if you needed to, get the scissors out and cut up things to make them work. But I don't want to do that.
Ryan Adams
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I want to make sure I'm with a girl that's a good kisser, and that when I wake up, I have coffee and a cigarette. That's all I really want out of life. That, and world domination.
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Fame is an unnatural construct and those who go in search of it are the least likely to find it.
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I was a nervous young man. I wanted to do so many things. And I was so enthusiastic and earnestly in love with so many things that I tried too hard. I tried really, really hard. And I made a lot of mistakes. I was afraid of a lot of stuff. And I kind of feel bad for that person I was.
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I'm sort of planting Post-It notes all over my psyche. Do not skateboard wasted. Do not buy $10,000 rugs. Be careful what you say to journalists. You don't have to stay up until 7 A.M. - tomorrow is a new day.
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I'm a pretty bad troubadour. I'm more of a music fan who got away with making records.
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Sometimes an idea from six years ago will come to me out of the blue. And maybe I haven't even seen the lyrics I wrote down, but I'll just have this physical memory of having written it, and in my mind I can see the piece of paper, and the words I wrote down, and then by muscle memory, I'll remember the chords that go along with it.
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It's like — I don't know, sometimes it's like chasing a pretty girl on the beach. And things I never thought I could do... I can do.
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Rock records. It's the main source of inspiration for people - fans, or musicians, or both - to act out in ways that they wouldn't normally act out. Especially rock critics. Ultimately, records don't really hurt anybody, and neither do reviews.
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I can sort of will that stuff to happen to me if I put myself in the right headspace. Then I can actually get to a space where it won't just be one song that comes through, but a series of them.
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It was never my first choice to be a singer/guitar player. I really wanted to play drums.
Ryan Adams
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Forever only takes its toll on some
Ryan Adams
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I use to be panicked, but know I'm curious!
Ryan Adams
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On Heartbreaker, I had to sing those songs. I drank the way I did those songs. I ate the way I did those songs. I communicated the way I did those songs.
Ryan Adams