Quotes from Afrojack

Holland is a really small country, but with a very strong club and festival scene. Dance music has been huge in Holland since the late eighties. So there were a lot of opportunities for producers and DJs to release records and play live.

At a festival, a lot of people came to see other artists, so you have to put on a signature set and performance: 'This is what I do, this is why I'm here.' At solo gigs, I'm a DJ - I'll play two-and-a-half hours, and not just my own music, also my favorite songs by other artists.

People need realness, reality. People can sense when someone is being pretentious or fake. It's because you feel it; you see it in someone's body language.

When I was a baby, my mom used to have a dance school, and she used to teach classes there. We didn't have money for a babysitter, so she always brought me with her to the dancing school. Back then, I was already watching and listening to Michael Jackson for a long time.

The only person you need to be credible to is yourself. When you stand in front of the mirror and nobody is watching, are you happy with yourself?

I think 2014 for me is going to give me the possibility to do even bigger things than anyone has done. I want to change the party scene - like, stop just being a DJ with lights, a big LED screen, and oh-look-at-me speakers. There's way more to a party, and I think everyone knows it. I want to make it special.

Every song, every form of art, clothing, shoes, it has to be special.

I always loved cars. I used to play 'Need for Speed' all the time... any racing game.

The coolest things in life are things that you have not done before. That's the key to life: new things always.

If you really want a radio station to play your song, go to that radio station every day with that song in your hand and say, 'Please play it.'

I'm a DJ who makes dance music who got to play with Sting.

People always say, 'How is it to be so successful?' I'm not successful yet. Richard Branson is successful. That's successful. Michael Jackson was successful. U2 was successful. I'm just a guy, doing okay. But I'm a happy guy doing okay.

I was thinking about working with Lady Gaga, not 'Born This Way' but more her old stuff that she did with RedOne from her first album. I think that would be really fun - a cool combination.

I was in school - I was a good learner; if I wanted to get something done, I could get it done. I was lazy, though. I was always, like, sort of an outcast. And when I got home, I was always doing music, but when I was doing music, no one was there to judge it, you know? It was just me in my bedroom. It gave me freedom and made me happy.

Cars for me are like a piece of art.

When I had my first gig, I was 18 in January in 2007. My first gig that I got paid, I was playing for 10 people in a 250 people capacity venue. The promoter wanted to book me because he liked my music. I played a couple of songs that made people dance. To me, that rush has always stayed the same.

I studied psychology for a couple of years as a personal hobby, so you start learning about people and listening to your intuition, like when you you're feeling that people are not being entirely straight with you.

When you're walking down the street or in the car just listening to the radio, and you're, like , 'Oh, that's my song.' You want to say, 'Hey Mom!' That never changes.