Lenny kravitz quotes

It's a good time for me to pursue acting, I suppose since I'm enjoying having another medium in which to express myself. I've been getting a great response to my work.

Change is growth. For me it has been a very spiritual and musical rebirth.

So that's why you've got to try, you got to breath and have some fun. Though I'm not paid, I play this game, and I won't stop until I'm done. But what I really want to know is - Are you gonna go my way?

If you ask a hundred people, they all give you different answers.

None of those material possessions do anything to make your life any better.... I know a lot of people who have a lot of everything, and they're absolutely the most miserable people in the world. So it won't do anything for you unless you're a happy person and can have peace with yourself.

What motivates it is life. Life is everything. Life influences my music and brings it forth. Life is always changing, so I'm always hearing new music.

I didn't really listen to rock 'n' roll until I moved to LA. We would ditch school, go get high, put on Zeppelin IV and just bug out.

I feel like my best work is in front of me. I'm in the studio now, and I'm having an amazing time making this new album. It's something I can't help.

The image is an image.

My dream is to become a farmer. Just a Bohemian guy pulling up his own sweet potatoes for dinner.

I mean, there are only so many notes. What makes something original is how you put it together.

I do my best to try to keep God with me on a personal level. It's my belief that God really wants a personal relationship with us.

When I stopped trying to write songs, that's when I'm able to begin writing songs. You have to just use your life, and the things around you for your inspiration.

If you look at the guys in the '70s, like Led Zeppelin, they had bigger planes than we do, they had more money. But they weren't singing about it.

I am not trying to change the world. I am just offering my gift that God gave me, and if somebody is moved by it, that's beautiful.

People always accuse me of being motivational in a way, like it was a bad thing, but that's just how I was raised. My mom raised me in a positive environment, with lots of love in my heart, and that reflects in my music.

I was taught by my grandfather that anything that your mind can conceive, you can have. It's a reality.

Good design is being able to put a $100,000 thing next to a $20 thing. If it looks right and it works then it works. It doesn't have to be expensive; it's all about the high meets low for me.

There's certain things in life that I love. One is architecture. And music, culture, food, people. New Orleans has all of that.

My life is perfect because I accept it as it is.

I identify more with women than with men. I guess I have a strong feminine side.

God forbid you sing about love. It's a lost concept.

Things that would shock us years ago are like nothing now.

I don't play the tuba.

Confusion makes people uncomfortable. They can't put their finger on me.

I feel like I'm only in the beginning of my career. I've only made five albums. It's not a lot.

I bought [John Lennon's] 'Plastic Ono Band,' and I listened to it over and over for months. It's a monumental work of genius.

Love , creativity, and opportunity is in the air. Take it in and do your thing.

I think that we have to be very careful and get back into the loop, get back to nature. Get back to God and not let the technology send us somewhere that we're going to regret.

I couldn't tell you what I am going to do next 'cause I have no idea, but I am open to anything.

We weren't put here to be miserable. We were put here to do the best we can, and we should take our energy and improve our state of being.

I mean, look at the people we celebrate - a lot of people who really don't do anything. They just walk the red carpets and go to all the parties, and they're hooked up with the right people, so they're celebrities. But what for?

Jimi Hendrix was just so fluid. His hands were connected to his soul, you know? His playing was just so emotional. You could feel the fire, you could feel the blues. You could feel the sadness. It's unbelievable.

I'm sure at one point I will do some acting again, but it would have to be the right thing. I'm not going to do it just because people are offering it to me. Not for those box-office, bullshit, money, noncreative people. But I'll do it when it's right to do it.

It's like a dream to come to Spain and stay for a couple of years and get somebody to teach me Spanish music.

Don't take it so seriously.

I wasn't the kind of person that liked waiting for autographs or following them, I just liked to go to the shows, study their records, driving many, many hours to different states to go to concerts.

A lot of my songs deal with spirituality and God, and I guess if you're in tune with that, you'll read into it.

I'm a very open and loving person. My whole thing has been "let love rule" since my first album. I'm about unity and peace and God.

I knew Slash in high school, but not very well. Just knew him as this kid that used to hang out in the hallway. Pretty much looked then the way he does now.

I basically camped out for a year and a half in an Airstream trailer on the beach out in front of the studio. I had no idea what I was gonna do, what kind of album I was gonna make - all I knew was that I wanted to sit there and just take in whatever came.

I just live my life and try to be present.

I'm just as white as I am black, and I'm just as Russian Jew as I am West Indian.

They think I'm being serious when actually I'm a very big clown. But you have to know me to see that. I'm constantly cracking up and cracking everybody else around me up.

When I was a kid and I bought a record, I ripped that thing open, I wanted to know who was playing what, what studio it was cut at, who was the string arranger, who was the engineer.

I get hired as a writer or producer and I do the best I can to bring out that artist. If somebody calls you to do something, you go right for that vision and you're aware of that person's vibe. You're trying to get inside of them.

When you see a close person you know pass in front of your eyes, it's hard core. After all that, I just wanted to enjoy every day. That was my goal. And to give thanks and to live fully.

I honestly don't remember how I wrote or did the songs. Or the sessions. They all become very much a blur. And each album is like that. It may be that there are different locations, it may take longer, shorter, or whatever, but it's always something that just happened.

I don't pull, I just receive.

Today, people are more into the glitz and the glamour of everything. We don't even read the inside of records anymore.

It was amazing to me that, all of a sudden, I was hearing my music on the radio and coming out of cars.

The idea of having to conform to someone else's ideal is unacceptable. I'm gonna be me. And if I can't be me, then I'd rather not do it.

I went to Paris in 1989 when the Americans didn't quite know what to do with me at first. Now, all those years later, it's kind of the same story. Not the same scenario, but kind of the same story.

I find cooking to be the one thing that relaxes me. I don't get to do it often . . .

I just live my life and try to be present. When I'm present in the moment and something comes, I can capture it, because it doesn't come from me, it's out there.

I’ll be quite frank with you — I didn’t know about Hunger Games — so when I’m telling kids and they say, ‘Who are you playing?’ and I say Cinna, they go, ‘Oh you’re playing the gay guy.’ That was an actual answer. I’ve never brought that up yet. That’s how they perceived it. So I thought about it, and I read the book and I don’t see that he is or isn’t [gay]. He’s a designer, he’s a stylist, he has gold eyeliner—that doesn’t mean anything either way.

I never sit down to write. When I'm moved, I do it. I just wait for it to come. You just hear it. I can't really describe writing. It's in my head.

When I'm making my music, I'm writing it, I'm producing it, I'm playing all the instruments, I'm performing. It's my own world where I do what I feel, and nobody tells me anything.

We have so many distractions. We're losing the family unit. We're losing the one-on-one. We're becoming extremely narcissistic. And we have to be careful about that. There's a lot to deal with out there.

Eventually you're going to have a digital transfer anyway when you make a CD, so it doesn't matter as long as what you're hitting first is what you want it to be.

I've always had to deal with being biracial, even in music. When I came on the scene, I'd go to these record labels, and they'd say things like, "Lenny Kravitz. That's a weird name." I'm brown-skinned and I've got these dreadlocks and I've got this Jewish last name.

A lot of people don't listen to the lyrics, really.

I've had to work very hard, and I don't really have a category or fit into any niche, so each time I come out with a new record, it's like, I'm a new guy.

(On being asked if he preferred to be a rock god or sex god) I am neither. My favourite role is father.

The story that I wanna tell is pretty much about the way I grew up. Being bi-racial, growing up in a big city and being an artist.

I've always been into films. I've been offered lots of films but they've always been these very stereotypical roles. They wanted me to play some gangster or street guy, or pimp, drug addict.

I enjoy what people at the concert give me and I can't do it without them, so it's really an exchange of energy that snowballs back and forth and becomes something that's very satisfying and very magical.

You can't even sing or play an instrument, so you just scream instead. You're living for an image, so you got five hundred women in your bed.

I was always talking about peace and love, even when I was a kid. That's how I grew up in my family.

I always read the Capitol as f—ked up pansexuality, everybody is doing everybody. Back to Greek and Roman times! It’s all happening.

At first people thought I was really arrogant and a snob about music because I'm so intense about my production and sound, and because they knew I didn't like new music so much.

The thing I love about acting is that it's got nothing to do with me; it's about bringing forth a director's vision. It's like a release. I'm glad it's come back into my life.

If I had to associate myself with one song, it would probably be Let Love Rule. It's so simple and to the point. It speaks for itself.

It's very important to vote. People died for this right.

We've always just gotten up there and played. We don't have any dancers, we don't have all that stuff going on, we just get up there and play.

To let go of the illusion that I'm in control is an important lesson, because I tend to be a person who likes to be in control, not only of my art but of my life and things around me, and it can be healthy up to a certain point, but at the end of the day, we have to go on faith and learn to let go and ride the wave.

You've got your entourage and people that help you make whatever happen around you. Everything's crazy and you're not paying attention to your inner feelings because you're so busy. I couldn't take it.

Love is the most powerful energy there is.

Oasis are not just influenced by the Beatles; they actually take stuff. Then they get praised.

I'm definitely happy with everything I've done. I stand behind it. You'll always be saying, "Well, I could change that, or I would do that differently." But you have to let it be what it is.

Beyond [Barack Obama] having made history as the first African-American president, I hope that he gets re-elected for what he does while in office, not for his skin color. I certainly believe he has the capacity.

I'm so happy. I am able to see the world just by making music, just by doing the thing that I loved doing when I was five years old.

One musician listens to another musician, and you get inspired and then you do your thing, but it's yours.

I have a great time with my band and on the stage we get along well.

My career has been a gradual climb. I think that's part of the reason why I've had longevity.

I'm half Jewish, I'm half black, I look in-between. I dress funny. I play all these different styles of music on one record. It's like, What is he doing?

Keeping grounded and keeping focused and keeping calm and thankful, that comes from God.

Where I'm at in life, the women have got to come with something else, not just the body, but the mind and spirit. It usually trips them out, but that's the way it's going to be. I'm looking at the big picture.

God is love and if you are ready, he always is.

I want to get away, I want to fly away. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I just need to know that I did the very best I could and that I was true to myself.

Race in this country is still the elephant in the room that no one wants to discuss.

Music is my life, it is a reflection of what I go through.

I don't think about the styles. I write whatever comes out and I use whatever kind of instrumentation works for those songs.

I made the record that my life had me make. Each one is like a diary.

If you listen to a lot of old funk records, the drums are really small. But you don't perceive it like that because the groove is so heavy.

I knew what I wanted to do from the time I was 5.

I'm always sort of reflecting on what I do on what I've done. Usually before I make a new album, I'll listen to the previous albums just to see where I've been.

Music definitely inspires my design all the time.

My mother gave lots of good advice and had a lot to say. As you get older, you realize everything she said was true.

For the last few years, it's been so chic for everybody to be miserable. Like if you're in with the cool crowd, you can't be happy.

I always try to keep the circumstances in my life fresh. I like to change the physical environment I live in, change the people around me and try to experience things for the first time. I think that keeps one on their toes, creatively and spiritually.

A lot of people pretty much only listen to the chorus.

Our music is always a reflection of where we are in a society. That's what enables so many people to do what they do. So my advice is to work at your craft. Be the best you can be at your craft and do it sincerely. Even in the world we live in today, that will give you longevity. At the end of the day, I want the quality of my work to stand, not how much I did.

When I hear music, it's visual; I see things.

Fly Away changed my life. There are certain songs that do. When I won the Grammy, I was in Paris. I sort of forgot about it.

You're never promised your next breath.

I wanted to make something that sounded very pure, organic, and personal. I wanted to make music that was timeless.

I'm not one of those artists who refuses to play their hits. I find that ridiculous. Hits are a blessing.

The way I was raised and the people that I grew up around for the most part were very humble people, and I appreciate all that they taught me, and their energy and their magnanimity help keep me grounded.

The most important thing for me is the moment, going from one thing to the next and hitting all the different levels and different points that make the whole what it is.

God said, Here. Have it. Enjoy it. I'm gonna be miserable?

You need to open up so that more comes through. And you can just feel that when your ego is not in the way and when you're letting it be what it wants to be. You have to let it be what it wants to be as opposed to what you think it should be.

My mother passed at the end of the Circus tour. After that I really needed to take some time and just chill out and get my head together.

I am still into the people I listened to growing up, so I completely remember what is like to be a fan, I haven't changed.

We're beginning to play God and get into cloning. We give up quickly. Divorce is an easy option. So why not just create your own mate? Synthesize a human being. You get tired of it, turn it off and put it in the closet like the vacuum cleaner.

I am trying to get closer to God.

Being free is a state of mind.

Me being in my grandmother's yard in Brooklyn. I must have been about 3. I had this red balloon. I let go of it, and it went up into the sky and just kept going and going. I completely flipped out, because I didn't understand why.

The image that the public gets is whatever they perceive it to be. Everybody has an opinion, everybody has their own vision, so I don't know what my public image is. I have no idea.

We should take time out to really love; we should take time out to find out who we are.

I used to do plays and some television commercials when I was younger. I guess my mom's being an actress got me interested in that, but music definitely took its place.

That's a big gift when people say to you that a song helped them or brought them to some place in their life where they needed to be.

I'm sure great scripts are hard to find, but I'm definitely open, and waiting to see what comes my way.

There are so many people that don't believe in themselves and don't have faith.