Nature is ever at work building and pulling down, creating and destroying, keeping everything whirling and flowing, allowing no rest but in rhythmical motion, chasing everything in endless song out of one beautiful form into another.
You can meditate on almost anything: a prayer, song, image or word. Close your eyes; sit in a comfortable position. Take a breath, and say the word out loud, emphasizing the humming sound at the end. When you come to the end of the breath, take another one and say the word again. And so on.
That's the amazing thing about music: there's a song for every emotion. Can you imagine a world with no music? It would suck.
We weren't raised Muslim - we were born Muslim. I didn't go to a Muslim school, but it was just the theme song. It was ambient.
I've always written pop songs. I tend to take inspiration from more experimental genres, like ambient music, but at the root of the song, it's verse-chorus-verse.
Before the Berlin Wall came down, we played behind the Iron Curtain and sang, 'Born in the U.S.A.,' and I thought, 'We're all going to die. The man is going to get us all killed.' But then you saw all these kids with the American flag and German flags together and singing the song, and it was, wow, like 'We Shall Overcome.'
I sang the 'Sunday Night Football' theme song two years in a row - my first part in American culture, although I still don't know anything about American football.
When I heard 'Jesus, Take the Wheel,' I was like, OK. Some people look at it as a song written for an American Idol, Carrie Underwood, who is wonderful. But when you're a songwriter listening to a song, you hear something else. I heard that song, and wow.
I sang 'American Pie' a lot in my stage set. It had a knack of uniting an audience in a sing-along. It's a clever song about American history but wrapped in a fantastic tune.
In a sense, 'American Pie' was a very despairing song but it can also be seen as very hopeful.
American Pie speaks to the loss that we feel. That's why that song has found the niche that it has.
Basically, in 'American Pie,' things are heading in the wrong direction. It is becoming less ideal, less idyllic. I don't know whether you consider that wrong or right, but it is a morality song in a sense.
That song didn't just happen. It grew out of my experiences. 'American Pie' was part of my process of self-awakening: a mystical trip into my past.
All roads lead to 'American Pie.' 'As American as apple pie' was the saying. It was some kind of a big American song that I wanted to write, which would be a conclusion for my show and bring all the songs home, which it still does. I can go anywhere I want with American music and come home to that. And it all makes sense.
When people ask what 'American Pie' is about, they're missing the point. The song isn't about the lines themselves - it's about what is between the lines. The song is about what isn't there.
In 1999, I just came out of putting out the song 'Vivrant Thing' and 'Breathe and Stop' off the 'Amplified' album. Clive Davis signed me to Arista.
I should say that I usually have a good experience on Amtrak. Still, if Amtrak could replace electric horns with steam whistles, they could make big strides. A horn is a horn is a horn, but a steam whistle is a voice and a song. People used to know which engineer was running which engine based on the call of the whistle.
I do quite like that Andrew Lloyd Webber song from 'Cats.' What's it called? 'Memory?' Sends shivers up your spine.
When you write a song like 'Forrest Gump,' the subject can't be androgynous. It requires an unnecessary amount of effort.
When I go into a room to write, it's like I'm not trying to say, 'I need to write a song that sounds like Eric Church or Jason Aldean.' I just try to get the best song that's in the room that day. Whatever style or sound that may be, I'm not afraid to attack it at that angle.