My family, they are definitely not an ordinary family.
Linda Perry
I want to be perceived - or maybe I perceive myself - as this really easygoing, honest person that's just giving. Realistically, I have those qualities, but I'm very aggressive. I can be very harsh. It comes off almost mean, you know?
I don't care if I go broke. I don't care about all that stuff. I just want to know that I did everything I wanted to do.
To give is one of the greatest gifts one could ever receive.
I'm a fast learner, and I believe in change, and I believe in growing, and I believe in moving forward and not staying in the same place.
I'm able to switch gears at any moment.
Pink is an extremely secure person. She knows who she is. When she's going to make a change, she's going to make the change. She just needs someone to help her with the vision.
I'm really good at bringing out greatness - in anybody. I don't even have to be in the studio. What a gift to be able to help people bring out the best qualities in them.
I wanted to go back to writing for myself and my fans. I built my own recording studio, started my own label, and decided to use the Internet to sell my records.
I think women gravitate toward me because I am a woman producing and songwriting, and there's none out there. There really isn't.
I want to be a producer and not a songwriter.
I did love 'What's Up?' but I hated the production.
A lot of people call me a 'machine,' and I don't think a lot of men or women operate the way I do.
I was scared of failure, of being a one-hit wonder, never being able to write another song again, never being able to sing again. Maybe everything that I think I am and who I want to be never will happen.
I was raised in a time when parents brought out belts, and you got tough love.
I'm overcritical, insensitive, and pushy when it comes to me. With everybody else, I'm a great listener, and all I want is for them to be happy.
The L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center has this wonderful program where they take in the youth, feed them, help them learn how to cook, clean, they help them get jobs, help them learn how to save their money, and they have shelters all over the city.
Rick Rubin's amazing, by the way. I just need to say that.
It's a humbling and amazing journey when you write a song in your bedroom, and you've got no money, and you're trying to write a song based on where you're at right at this moment.
Music comes from inside. It's not a style. It's just passion.
My process of songwriting comes from a very real place: a place that when you watch 'American Idol' - God bless it, it's probably an awesome experience that these people are having, but it's not a real one.
I've had many songs where I've gone, 'Oh, my God, this song is going to be huge!' but it wasn't the right artist, or something just didn't happen. It didn't make the song any worse. It just didn't line up. That does happen.
I'm great at working with people and collaborating. And if my biggest gift of all is that I'm really good at pulling things from people and helping them become better at what they're doing, I'm here, as I believe all of us are, to be of service.
I love being home. I play with my dogs.
I want to show people my interpretation of what creating music is, and this is where it comes from: the heart.
I'm 44, and I've never had a problem being gay, and maybe I dodged a lot of bullets, and maybe I'm one of the lucky ones. I want to make sure every kid can have that experience.
I would love for Radiohead to give me a call and say, 'Hey, kid, we wanna see what it's like working with you. We want you to produce our next record.'
I don't want to be a rock star. I had my 15 minutes of fame.
I told my mom I was gay when I was 16, and my mom said with her heavy Brazilian accent, 'OK, but at least look good at it.'
You kind of have to have no ego to be a producer and a songwriter.
I've been touching instruments since the day I was born. My mother is Brazilian, and she listens to Brazilian music. My father was a musician, and I've seen pictures of him when he was in a band playing guitar and piano. He loved country music, Frank Sinatra, and stuff like that.
I want to be so giving and collaborative, but my best songs were written on my own.
I don't read music. I refuse to learn how to do that. I barely know half the chords I'm playing. I like being naive when it comes to that.
In no way am I a spiritual person. I'm not some guru geek.
It's not a 'sexy' position, being the producer. You have to be very bossy. You have to be very aggressive.
When making any record, a producer has a list of things you hope an artist brings to the studio. Songs that are strong even without the bells and whistles.
I nurture people's talents because, at the end of it, that's what they're left with. They're left with themselves.
It'll never get old to hear a song that I wrote on the radio or to hear what someone experienced when they heard a song I wrote.
If you're not confident, people push you around. That's it. It's super-simple.
For me, Heaven is evoking emotions through sound.
Food is supposed to be vibrant, fresh, filled with color.
I don't think I could make a pop album.
I have a lot of songs that I kind of put away, and I don't let anybody else hear them, and those are my songs.
I'm a horrible producer when it comes to me, but for other artists, I don't know what it is, but something happens, and I'm just really good at it.
I usually write songs in a guy key because my voice is so husky.
I didn't like being out in the limelight. I love performing, but that's it.
My number one goal is to take over the music business and run a really great record company.
People are gonna get tired of Linda Perry the producer, but I will always be in the music business. And I will always be successful in it.
I don't think I'm the world's greatest producer or songwriter or anything.
I feel that when I listen to music - not that it's bad - it's not emotional. It has a gimmick to it. It's selling something: the artist, the producer, something. The emotional capacity is very small, for the listener as well.
