Of course, when I started my career, like anyone else who was 16 at the time, we were besotted by the rock-n-roll scene from America, and all I was interested in was having a career of my own.
Careers, like rockets, don't always take off on time. The trick is to always keep the engine running.
Earthshaking fire from the center of the Earth will cause tremors around the New City. Two great rocks will war for a long time, then Arethusa will redden a new river.
From the time I got dressed in the back of a deflated, flat-tired, fish-smelling station wagon for Rocky. It's always been do it yourself, kind of like paper-clip it together.
I got a horse when I was eight or 10 years old. And dad used to take me to the rodeo back home. I got into it big time.
When I was 17, my producer Rodney Jerkins was working with Michael Jackson at the time. He knew how much I wanted to meet Michael Jackson, so he says, 'Would you like to come and meet him?' I'm like, 'Are you serious? Of course I want to meet Michael Jackson! Where do I meet you? Where do we come?'
For a long time, sure, I was letting the pressure of being Rodney King get to me. It ain't easy. Even now, I walk into a place wondering, 'What people are thinking? Do they know who I am? What do they think about what happened? Do they blame me for the all those people who died?'
By the time I was in high school, Roe v. Wade had passed, so that was also happening; girls were getting pregnant and getting abortions - and that happened in my school too.
My little boy, West, and my wife, they're my rock and that's the thing that keeps driving me to do better at what I do professionally. There was a time in my career where I had been on this huge roller coaster ride and I'd really got in the spot where I could've hung up it and just been a songwriter.
I've spent about that amount of time trying to tell the public that there was purpose in... my business, my career and the roller coaster ride... how the people I associated with worked together.
The short amount of time I'm out on the runway is like going on a rollercoaster. It's such a happy, exciting feeling. I'm more like a racehorse ready to go - I just want to get out there.
I was only 16 when I was selected for 'Madrasapattinam.' I celebrated my 17th birthday on the set of the film. That was the first time I had travelled to India, and it was a rollercoaster ride. I soon fell in love with the country.
'Fast Food Nation' appeared as an article in 'Rolling Stone' before it was a book, so I was extending it from the article, and by that time, everyone could read the article.
I measure success in terms of the connection with the audience, which we've been able to do in spades. I mean, it's very hard to do that. You think about it, you go back in time, you can say, 'Well, there's, like, 'Saturday Night Live' and 'Rolling Stone' or 'MTV.' I think 'Vice' is in that category now.
I saw 'Rolling Stone' magazine once, and they were talking about the top 50 songs, and there wasn't one Sly song; how does that happen? But, Sly isn't the type to brown nose for props. He's always known what he had, what he was capable of; I'm just proud that he took the time and effort to put it to music.
My first real writing job was at 'Rolling Stone,' so I wrote about rock-and-roll and politics and the like. At the time, I really didn't know what I wanted to write, and I did a bunch of investigative journalism.
'Time Rolls On' is my most political piece so far. It's not on my album because people didn't support it.
There are certain romances that belong in certain cities, in a certain atmosphere, in a certain time.
I came here from Romania when I was 12 years old. I had an accent. High school was tough a little bit for a few years. I wanted to fit in. I wanted to be liked. I wanted to be good-looking. I wanted to be popular. I spent a lot of time thinking, 'What are these people going to think of me?'
I'm a romantic, and we romantics are more sensitive to the way people feel. We love more, and we hurt more. When we're hurt, we hurt for a long time.
