Ville Valo Quotes

I wanted to give people a taste of my own music through the sound and style of my covers.

Music. It's all creativity right here, right now.

There's a lot of music at my fingertips that I can be influenced by. And just because I play a horn, I don't need to sound, or try to capture, what was happening before me. I can just respect it and learn from it.

I get a lot of joy out of covering other people's songs, and, at my best, I think I bring something a little new to a lot of them.

I think, now that I've been writing songs in general, whether it's for the group or for me, I definitely feel like I got a little trigger happy, because it was so exciting to have production and create and put a lot in there.

I get the biggest kick out of it, to hear words that I wrote and chords that I wrote being sung by somebody else.

I've always covered some Dylan songs. I do one or two. And I do them because they're great songs. You know some people cover songs they wish they could have written, not me. I like to cover songs I know I could not have ever written.

I'm kind of lucky in the fact that I can take something that's in my head and write it down, or I can listen to a piece of music that somebody else has written and try to tap into what the music's saying and just kind of follow that, you know. I mean, nine times out of 10, I'm just kind of following where the music takes me.

I just try to get inside the song and imagine what comes next.

It is jazz music that called me to be a musician and I have always sang the songs that moved me the most. Singers, like Frank Sinatra and myself, we interpret the songs that we like. Not unlike a Shakespearean actor that goes back to the greatest words ever written, we go back to the greatest songs.

Whoever best serves the song is going to be served by the song.

'Hatful of Hollow' and 'The Smiths' were lent to me, and they made me want to create music that might make another person feel like they made me feel - to have an effect on someone.

I've always loved doing covers. Some artists don't like covers. Some listeners don't like covers. But I love them. It gives you a new perspective production-wise. It's easier for me, if I'm starting a new record, I like to produce a few songs that aren't mine just so it frees me up not to worry about it so much.

Out of all the artistic things I do, music is the most rewarding because it's so hard to write songs.

I usually have an idea of how I want a song to sound, but I don't always know how to get there.

Great classic music that I've been turned on to has not only inspired and influenced me, but it has had an effect on my songwriting.

Musicians should not play music. Music should play musicians.

I used to study 'Hunky Dory' - and be mad that I hadn't figured out anything that cool!

As an artist, it is heartwarming to see other artists appreciate your work by making covers and renditions of your original track.

I try to take whatever I can from the songs I grew up listening to, these vibed-out pop numbers, and make them my own in some weird way.

What's cool about making music is when you create a record, it comes from somewhere.

You can't help but have ideas when you're inspired musically.

I'm not one of those guys who can just take a guitar into a room and come out with a song. I need all my instruments dotted around.

The myriad of ways that a song can be interpreted is astounding to me, and it's part of the allure of writing.

I can't even begin to express the joy I get from writing songs, both on my own and with others, I hold it all sacred.