Quotes About Originality

That's exactly why I came into music in the first place: to be inspired by what I hear to make it something else, to make it my own. That's how culture, creativity, moves, isn't it?

I am not a movie star or a football player, I just do my thing.

And I don't want people to think that I make movies based on other films.

You have to figure out ways to do things on your own. I do my own thing, and I don't pay much attention to what anyone else is doing.

I have only a mind to live, to enjoy - i.e., to work as an artist, and produce my works; but not for the muddy brains of the common herd.

People said my records were 'funky' and 'muddy,' but the truth is they were just demos.

Muhammad Ali was such an original - his antics, his character, his charisma, his strength, his individuality.

My mum is an artist and very into creative expression and freedom.

I know that I basically have the same hair as Beaker from 'the Muppets.'

I'm not the comic innovator that Bill Murray and Eddie Murphy are. I can't just come out with an incredible line.

What I look for in a script is something that challenges me, something that breaks new ground, something that allows me to flex my director muscle. You have got to think fast in this business, you've got to keep reinventing yourself to stay on top.

We have listened too long to the courtly Muses of Europe.

That's just the music industry. They always want you to write something like the one that was popular.

I always felt independent of musical fashion.

I feel so much more comfortable when I'm working on material which makes other people scratch their heads and ask, 'You're going to make a musical out of that?'

For a while we were chasing a book by Graham Greene to do Brighton Rock as a musical. We didn't get the rights, so we decided to create something from scratch, with Jonathan. By that time we were big fans of his work.

I'm a musical genius.

We decided we didn't want to do a musical for TV because the idea of writing a musical that would be seen on television once seems insane.

If you're going to make a musical, don't cartoon it from the play. Make it better than the play. Have a reason for making it sing.

I like to originate new roles and characters for musical theater.

In the world of musical theatre, if everyone says it's a good idea, you wonder why nobody has done it before.

Our first radio single, 'The Stage,' was eight-and-a-half minutes long. Unabashedly, we wanted to push the limits musically, lyrically, and instrumentation-wise.

Whatever is original in my writing comes from my musical apprenticeship. I look for rhythm in words. I imagine words as if they were musical chords. Often I'll write something, read it, and find it musically unsatisfactory. There is a musical imperative in my choice of words.

What makes Avenged so exciting to me musically is that people either love us or hate us, but nobody sounds like us.