Quotes About Inspiration

The reason I went ahead with making the music for 'Bombay Velvet' was because I loved the script.

Sweet Jane' is my favorite song by Lou Reed the writer, at least the Velvet Underground Lou Reed.

I wish I could write 'Taxi Driver,' or 'Blue Velvet,' something brave, audacious, dramatic and dark. I don't know if I have the darkness in my own soul to be able to tap into it, unfortunately.

At 18, I moved to L.A. with my heavy metal band Avant Garde, which was very much influenced by Metallica. At 19, I got a job at Tower Records, and everything started to change very quickly. I started listening to the Velvet Underground, Pixies, early Nirvana, Sonic Youth, and also earlier music like the Beatles.

'You Talk' was originally a copy of a certain Velvet Underground song.

The Velvet Underground is probably the best band that's ever existed, assuredly the best American one.

I am working on 'Bombay Velvet'. The music for it is jazz from the '60s.

When we came along in 1982, music was getting boring - like 1976 when punk hadn't happened. We wanted to be rock 'n' roll. We grew up with The Velvet Underground, the Stones and Mars bars and Marianne Faithfull and we knew we didn't want to be boring - and we weren't!

'V for Vendetta' is an amazing movie, and it had an obvious message, but it was done so perfectly. I got out of the movie, and I wanted to march so hard. I wanted to be an activist.

Not every great idea needs to be Campbell-generated. It's clear that partners and vendors and other external sources will generate innovative ideas for us.

It's strange the way Instagram has become a really crazy sourcing opportunity for me. I never thought I'd be saying that, but you see these amazing vendors halfway across the world.

I was always following my brothers. If my brothers hadn't played, I never would have picked up a racket. Tennis isn't the most popular sport in Venezuela.

One of my biggest inspirations is President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. Yea, President Hugo.

There were certain Ray Charles albums and a couple of early Marvin Gaye records that I used to listen to with a vengeance. That's how you forge a style. It excites you, and you lean toward it almost unconsciously. I was also a Beatles fanatic, but I didn't emulate them the way I did the R&B artists.

But I find the best things I do, I do when I'm trying to avoid doing something else I'm supposed to be doing. You know, you're working on something. You get bugged, or you lose your enthusiasm or something. So you turn to something else with an absolute vengeance.

I'm passionate about fantasy movies. I'm passionate about comic book movies. I'm passionate about superheroes. And movies about vengeance. And all of that - the stuff that I grew up reading.

Venice is eternity itself.

A realist, in Venice, would become a romantic by mere faithfulness to what he saw before him.

When I did 'Venice Dawn,' there were times where people would cry after listening to it.

I love to get out and see real life and to walk, which is why I love Venice so much - it's such a great walking city.

When I think of Venice Beach, my father's painting is what comes to mind.

When I went to Europe for the first time, I went to Paris and then to Venice. So after Paris, Venice was my first great European city, and it just blew me away.

Venom was a band that strongly influenced the image and the idea behind Slayer.

I started to listen to music in '80 or '81, bands like Queen or Kiss. Then in '83, when I first got into Slayer and Venom and stuff like that, they just blew my mind.