Elvis Costello Quotes

I'm just the mere shadow of my former selfishness. I crave the silhouette of your kiss.

I used to be disgusted; now I try to be amused.

I believe that music is connected by human passions and curiosities rather than by marketing strategies.

I feel like a juggler running out of hands.

Don't wear your heart on your sleeve when your remarks are off the cuff.

I can't say anymore than I love you. Anything else would be a waste of breath.

The radio is in the hands of such a lot of fools tryin' to anesthetize the way that you feel.

And I don't feel any form of music is beyond me in the sense of that I don't understand it or I don't have some love for some part of it.

Women hear rhythm differently than men.

Maybe I just never learned my harmony part, because what everybody says sounds odd to them sounds perfectly natural to me.

Don't start me talking, I could talk all night. My mind goes sleepwalking while I'm putting the world right.

I wish you luck with a capital F.

History repeats the old conceits, the glib replies, the same defeats.

Music is more like water than a rhinoceros. It doesn't charge madly down one path. It runs away in every direction.

They say you better listen to the voice of reason But they don't give you any choice 'cause they think that it's treason. So you had better do as you are told. You better listen to the radio.

It's the damage that we do and never know. It's the words that we don't say that scare me so.

Your mind is made up but your mouth is undone.

Songs are more powerful than books.

There are many critics who have an idealised version of where my strengths lie.

I've been lucky to listen to lots of different types of music.

And I'm up while the dawn is breaking, even though my heart is aching. I should be drinking a toast to absent friends instead of these comedians.

Morrissey writes wonderful song titles, but sadly he often forgets to write the song.

My ultimate vocation in life is to be an irritant.

The battle with the bottle is nothing so novel.

Imagination is a powerful deceiver.

Why can't a man stand alone? Must he be burdened by all that he's taught to consider his own? His skin and his station, his kin and his crown, his flag and his nation They just weigh him down

Though the passion still flutters and flickers, it never got into our knickers.

You need a platform upon which to release an orchestral record, otherwise it's just going to be an obscurity.

She said she was working for the ABC news, it was as much of the alphabet as she knew how to use.

Writing about music is like dancing about architecture - it's really a stupid thing to want to do.

Patsy Cline belongs shoulder-to-shoulder with Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald.

Sometimes I write notes that I have difficulty singing.

Really the only thing holding a lot of records together is the personality of the singer, and the will to write all of these different things.

These are the sort of things that push you on in music - the curiosity, a passion for new ideas.

There is something wrong with you if you don't get angry about something.

I've never had any real concern about posterity. I hope some people will be sorry when I'm not here, but I'm not playing for that.

Don't try to touch my heart, it's darker than you think. And don't try to read my mind, because it's full of disappearing ink.

And obviously, when I started out, I had a little bit more curiosity than some, and went seeking out the original artists, or in some cases searching up country music.

You do have to be a bit careful with your voice. It is an instrument.

My grandfather and my father disagreed about music, not least of all because my dad wanted to improvise. It wasn't just that he wanted to play different music; it was just that he came off the dots.

I can write orchestrations, but I can't sight-read music and play at the same time. I don't have enough facility.

The theme of exile is attractive to me, because it's sort of like the family business. Not just music, but travel.

You can be addicted to misery the same way as you can be addicted to drugs.

Oh I used to be disgusted and now I try to be amused. But since their wings have got rusted, you know, the angels wanna wear my red shoes.

I find humming is very useful.

And over the last ten years, after my work with the Brodsky Quartet, I had the opportunity to write arrangements for chamber group, chamber orchestra, jazz orchestra, symphony orchestra even.

I've never felt British. I'm just not interested in national identity. I don't know why.

People tend to repeat the same quotes at me that I said when I was 23. And of course, you say things then, and sometimes they're ill-advised.

It's the stupid details that my heart is breaking for.

But there are things in Il Sogno that the methods of The Delivery Man could never achieve.