I like to write about relationships. I like it when my friends come over and we crowd around the piano and sing Journey songs at the top of our lungs... And I like things that make me feel seven again. I don't ever look down on people for the way they choose to have fun; it's just not necessarily the way I like to have fun.
I don't talk about my personal life in great detail. I write about it in my songs, and I feel like you can share enough about your life in your music to let people know what you're going through.
When I'm writing a record, I kind of don't listen to much music. Just because I want to be inspired solely on the emotion; just based on how it feels.
My audience has really become a very diverse group of people. It's not just 15-year-old girls. That's kind of what allows me to write from all the different places I want to write from.
I write songs that are like diary entries. I have to do it in order to feel sane.
If guys don't want me to write bad songs about them, they shouldn't do bad things.
Most of the time, songs that I write end up being finished in 30 minutes or less.
Factoring in millions of people when I'm writing a song is not a good idea. I don't ever do it.
(Talks about Lucky You) "The song was about a girl who didn't fit in and she didn't care and she was different than everyone else. I think there's a long chorus of me singing "Do do do do do do do do do do". It's very young and I look back and it's kind of interesting to hear those kind of storylines and the lyrics that I used to write compared to the lyrics that I write now.
I have to practice to be good at guitar. I have to write 100 songs before you write the first good one.
Sometimes I write about my own life. And sometimes I write about situations I see my friends going through. Sometimes I write about a scene I saw in a movie. I take inspiration from all different places.
I like to write about love and love lost because I feel like there are so many different subcategories of emotions.
I want to write a song for someone who has just fallen in love or someone single and living their live.
Sometimes when relationships end, you write an e-mail and say everything you wish you said. Sometimes you don't push send.
I don't think I'd ever make an album of just covers because I love writing my own music.
I keep going back to love when I write songs because I can't figure it out.
My favorite thing in life is writing about life, specifically the parts of life concerning love. Because as far as I’m concerned, love is absolutely everything.
And you know there’s nothing like writing a song about someone who’s mean to you, and just makes your life miserable…and then winning a Grammy for it.
I've made sure that in any situation and with any record label, I'm allowed to write my own music.
Throughout all of the changes that have happened in my life, one of the priorities I've had is to never change the way I write songs and the reasons I write songs. I write songs to help me understand life a little more. I write songs to get past things that cause me pain. And I write songs because sometimes life makes more sense to me when it's being sung in a chorus, and when I can write it in a verse.
When I'm 40 and nobody wants to see me in a sparkly dress anymore, I'll be, like: 'Cool, I'll just go in the studio and write songs for kids.'
The words. I love words. I love to write. Being an artist is what I love.
I never write about the road. I never write about hotels or anything like that.
I think when people make a record with a goal in mind - like taking it to the next level or making them seem more mature - that gets in the way of writing great songs.
I watched their reactions and emotions, especially to understand what was what I was doing wrong. But then I realized that if I could see these people and take note of everything I saw, I could write a good song.
