Quotes About Inspiration

It's like Liverpool. Everybody went for the music. All the young musicians seemed to gravitate to Asbury Park.

I love Asbury Park. It's like the Liverpool of America.

When I saw 'Jurassic Park' as a kid, that was the first time I thought about making movies for a living.

I'm an actor because of movies like 'Indiana Jones' and 'Jurassic Park.'

My dad's also a musician, so jazz was always around the house. When I was 11, I developed an interest in it, and he took me to Leimert Park. At that time, it was the artistic hub of L.A., and it was right in South Central. The first concert I went to, I saw Pharoah Sanders at the World Stage club there, which only holds, like, 30 people.

For me, I feel like God is intuition and an inner knowing. I think it's difficult to be successful without that because that's where you have to come from if you're really going to knock it out of the park. For me, it's more a sort of a universal energy.

I'll never forget watching my dad perform in a Shakespeare in the Park production of 'Richard III' in New York.

I wouldn't be as comfortable with who I am if it had not been for Prince. I mean, my label 'Wondaland' would not exist without 'Paisley Park' coming before us.

In a park, you are not working with studio materials or a flat piece of paper. You have grass and the people and the city and the daylight.

Growing up in Highland Park, in high school, I had some very influential teachers: I had a math teacher who taught calculus that helped me learn to be in love with mathematics; I had a chemistry teacher who inspired us to work what was in the class and to go beyond.

My senior year at College Park, University of Maryland, I took an elective class in crime fiction taught by Charles C. Mish. He turned me on in a big way to reading and books. I was lucky to have a teacher who changed the course of my life.

Park Bo Young was like a teacher to me. Personally, we were good friends, but at the same time, I admired her acting and learned a lot from her.

I've had a bond with West Ham since growing up as a kid, going to Upton Park, looking up to the players.

I used to wake up before school when my mom was already at work. That's where I first heard a lot of music, like All Time Low, Fall Out Boy, Miley Cyrus, Linkin Park.

I've been a huge fan of the 'Jurassic Park' movies. It was one of the reasons why I wanted to be an actor.

I knew when I got on tour that if I had the opportunity to give back to my community, which is Rose Park, I would.

I live near a beautiful park, and when I walk around it, the beauty of it can take your breath away. It makes you realize there is something bigger, certainly bigger than me.

Lee Chang-dong, Park Chan-wook and Bong Joon-ho. I think the three filmmakers tell the stories that they really want to tell. Their movies always reveal what they think must be told. I have a lot of respect for that.

I'm up before 6, but then I'm parked in front of the PC until noon.

I listened to classical music. I listened to jazz. I listened to everything. And I started becoming interested in the sounds of jazz. And I went to a concert of Jazz at the Philharmonic when we lived in Omaha, Nebraska, and I saw Charlie Parker play and Billie Holiday sing and Lester Young play, and that did it. I said, 'That's what I want to do.'

I didn't know what the hell Charlie Parker was playing... I just liked the way he played.

I love guys like Charlie Parker.

I grew up with all these old jazz guys in the '70s in L.A., and they grew up idolizing Charlie Parker, Charles Mingus, Lester Young - all of these incredible musicians.

I listen to anything anyone gives me. I always go back to a few basic favorites. I can always listen to Django Reinhardt and hear something I haven't heard before. I like to listen to Art Tatum and Coltrane and Charlie Parker. Those are guys who never seem to run out of ideas.