James Brown quotes:

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James Brown died owing me $50,000. But I loved James Brown. -- Don King
It's like James Brown used to say... I don't know, but whatever I play it's got to be funky. -- Curtis Jones
I was never really that interested in the punk movement. I was a blues guy: I liked Motown, James Brown. -- Gary Oldman
You can't really dance properly to James Brown. If you dance to James Brown, you look like an idiot. There's a lot of jerking. -- Sandra Bullock
James Brown became my father. He would talk to me the way a father talked to a son. He became the father I never had. -- Al Sharpton
You want a hero in the music world? James Brown. He brought a feeling to music without really using words. He's just famous for his sound. -- David Lee Roth
If it weren't for the mentorship and guidance from people like my mother, James Brown and others, I wouldn't have been able to make something of my life. -- Al Sharpton
You say 'African music' and you think 'tribal drumming.' But there's a lot of African music that's like James Brown, and a lot, too, that sounds very Hispanic. -- Damian Marley
I love a good lyricist - always have. The thing that inspired me most was the different performers, like Tina Turner, James Brown, Michael Jackson, Madonna, even Janet Jackson. -- Jennifer Lopez
I used to break dance. I can do some good James Brown footwork. But now I think I've danced too much. My girlfriend made fun of me: 'Enough with the dancing.' -- Sam Rockwell
But that kind of falls in line; when you think about it, James Brown was a funk minimalist. All of those parts create a sum that's larger than than the individual parts. -- Charlie Hunter
I've studied a lot of great people over the years - Pete Seeger, James Brown - and tried to incorporate elements that I've admired, though I can't say I dance like James. -- John Fogerty
Every James Brown cut makes a party get crazy. He's the god of all music. I always play different wild remixes of his songs because people start bugging out when they realise what I'm playing. -- Afrika Bambaataa
Psy is fantastic. He's shifted the planet. He's got the whole world dancing. And it's a rarity in this world. Only four people made that happen in history - James Brown, Michael Jackson, yours truly and Psy. -- MC Hammer
James Brown is the perfect example of flashy but classy. Classy doesn't have to mean boring. His gear was flamboyant but without being so over the top. The cape was probably the biggest part of his persona. He looked like Superman. -- Mayer Hawthorne
One night all the James Brown band was playing on stage and I look in the back and I could see Mick Jagger and Keith Richards trying to get in the club and they couldn't get in cause it was to crowded. -- Tommy Chong
Anyone who can do the splits and come back up on the backbeat, as James Brown and Prince can, has my eternal respect. Prince, who is a genius of the highest order, can come back up while singing and playing the guitar. -- Bill Nighy
James Brown was my favorite, my absolute idol. Every time I played with him was like a music lesson, and I never thought I could be so funky! I mean, a white boy from Canada - a Jew - getting down with his funky bad self! -- Paul Shaffer
What I like about Elvis is the same thing I like about James Brown, Michael Jackson, Prince. These guys, back in the day, there was no smoke and mirrors. It was just raw talent. They would step out onstage and command an audience. Talk about awesome. -- Bruno Mars
I felt Michael Jackson was inspired a little bit more from the elegance of a Fred Astaire. Michael loved Sammy Davis, Jr. and James Brown and Judy Garland and Fred Astaire. But he wasn't any of those people. To be inspired is one thing, but he made it all his own. -- Kenny Ortega
You go through the Civil Rights struggle, everybody knew the songs - 'We shall overcome.' Everybody would sing it. Music helped us. James Brown, 'Say It Loud - I'm Black and I'm Proud.' They helped black people figure out how to navigate what was a very treacherous place in America for them. -- Geoffrey Canada
When I first played New York, it was with James Brown at the Apollo, and I was playing in a band under the name The Valentinos. I remember Sam Cooke saying, 'I want you to go in there with James Brown. I couldn't be as hard on you as James Brown would be.' But we came out marching like soldiers. -- Bobby Womack
My definition of hip hop is taking elements from many other spheres of music to make hip hop. Whether it be breakbeat, whether it be the groove and grunt of James Brown or the pickle-pop sounds of Kraftwerk or Yellow Magic Orchestra, hip hop is also part of what they call hip-house now, or trip hop, or even parts of drum n' bass. -- Afrika Bambaataa
I grew up in Deptford in south London, and at that time I used to wear toppers, loon pants and tonic suits from shops like Take 6 and Topman. I was a bit of a soul boy, but I had a very eclectic taste in music - I was into James Brown and Bowie; and I was the only kid in the neighbourhood who would also be listening to Chopin. -- Gary Oldman
The hardest thing about being James Brown is I have to live. I don't have no down time. -- James Brown
I think the best thing about being James Brown is looking at my little son. Hopefully I can make my son a role model to a lot of people. -- James Brown
James Brown is the reason I play guitar. -- Kevin Eubanks
I was a James Brown junkie as a kid. -- L.A. Reid
Our immediate influence in b-boying was James Brown, point blank. -- Crazy Legs
In '87, I used to do this awful, awful James Brown impression. -- Wanda Sykes
When my woman kisses me I start dancing like James Brown. Ow! I Feel Good! -- Godfrey
I invented rock & roll. Jimi Hendrix was my guitar player. James Brown was my vocalist. -- Little Richard
James Brown lives, as long as someone steps out of their body and dances uncontrollably. -- Al Sharpton
I'm crazy about James Brown. I'm crazy about soul music. And then the blues. Rhythm and blues. -- Bill Nighy
I'm not James Brown. I'm not Sam Cooke. I'm Charley Pride. I'm just me and that's what you got. -- Charley Pride
...the people at large absolutely gave James Brown respect. He was an original like a Rembrandt or a Picasso -- Aretha Franklin
James Brown and Frank Sinatra are two different quantities in the universe. They represent two different experiences of the world. -- Amiri Baraka
Fortunately, I'm known as the hardest-working woman in showbiz, not to compete with James Brown. I've always been a multi-tasker. -- Tamara Tunie
I love Sly Stone and James Brown and Stevie Wonder, and I want my music to reflect some of that. -- Al Jarreau
I grew in the inner city, listening to Stevie Wonder, Donny Hathaway, James Brown, The Commodores - lots of soul music. -- Stefon Harris
Doing this James Brown thing for the last couple of days has been ideal. But it's a different kind of fun. -- Jules Shear
James Brown is important because he decorates the clock correctly and he's good with lower mathematics. Don't get me wrong - he's good. -- Don Van Vliet
Cardiff Stadium was a warm up for the 3 Hyde Park shows. James Brown opened. And I think it may be the only time we played Mini Epic live. -- Chad Smith
James Brown was one of the first artists who found four bars that he liked and played them the entire way through, and then he just added to it vocally. -- Brian Austin Green
When Rolling Stone handed me this crazy assignment to be in the studio with James Brown, they had the misapprehension that I'd written for them already just because I claimed my character had. -- Jonathan Lethem
My mom and dad would take me all over. One night we'd be at the Apollo watching James Brown, and then I'd be at the Joffrey Ballet. It was that kind of scene. -- Lenny Kravitz
When you love a song so much you have to sing, you know how you feel - it releases something in you that resonates as true, whether it's James Brown or Joni Mitchell. -- Bonnie Raitt
My dad was into the 1950s doo-wop era. If you look at those groups, or at James Brown, Jackie Wilson and the Temptations in the 1960s, you'll see you had to be sharp onstage. -- Bruno Mars
You could put Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley on one side of the stage, and James Brown on the other, and you wouldn't even notice the others were there! -- Bill Wyman
When we heard we were topping the bill over James Brown we couldn't believe it. We tried for two days to get it changed round - I mean you can't follow an act like that. -- Mick Jagger
James Brown's Live at the Apollo is not just a musical whiplash, it's a spiritual cleansing. You can just close your eyes and see him doing the splits, kicking the mic stand and doing a 360. -- Ted Nugent
I usually listen to various kind of singers. Curtis Mayfield was my favorite. James Brown, Tina Turner, queen of soul, I started to get that musical essence from that time before I even do my first song. -- Burning Spear
Where I came from in the country, there was no place to hear pop music like Little Richard and people like that. Later, I heard James Brown, Otis Redding, The Drifters, The Four Aces, The Ink Spots. -- Percy Sledge
I've never seen a performer create electricity with an audience like James Brown. He's got everybody in his hands and whatever he wants to do with them, he does it. It's amazing. I've always thought he was underrated. -- Michael Jackson
America...Do not touch my TV, my DVD, my stereo, my dual-deck VCR. Do not touch my old school, my new school, my slow jams, my party jams, my happy rap, and you better not touch...My James Brown. -- Bernie Mac
I think art can really serve to inspire a movement - and, of course, it has in the past. The Civil Rights movement wouldn't have the same resonance without the songs from everyone from Pete Seeger to Odetta to James Brown. -- Saul Williams
There would be no Rock and Roll without Ike Turner, James Brown, Chuck Berry, Fats Domino, Allen Toussaint, etc. Fake ghetto books and fake ghetto music. Elvis Presley, whom they idol, is merely a karaoke makeover of James Brown and Chuck Berry. -- Ishmael Reed
What I like about Elvis is the same thing I like about James Brown, Michael Jackson, Prince. These guys, back in the day, there was no smoke and mirrors. It was just raw talent. They would step out onstage and command an audience. -- Bruno Mars
I'm coming from a Ginuwine and Usher background: slow and smooth songs. And that's why I really connected to Sam Cooke, because he was just very smooth. It's not like the James Brown types, which is all great stuff, but he was totally set apart from those guys. -- Leon Bridges
Everything's stolen. Everything precious - be it a kiss, or be it James Brown - gets misappropriated to the aid of the advertising executives. So, an act of reclamation, somewhere else to be: that's what I want my music to be. Somewhere you can step into. A place. -- David Gray
Blues artists now try and stay in a box. Back in the day at all the clubs you would see James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, The Isley Brothers, Little Richard and Etta James all play the same venues. It was a mix of funk, soul, blues and rock 'n' roll. -- Phil Collen
It's bluesy, rocky jazz. I call it soul music, but it's not James Brown soul music. It comes from my soul. It comes from a deeper place. Duffy has that similar old school soul sound to herself. If I opened for Duffy, that would make sense to me, in my head. -- Tinsel Korey
I'm not a star. I'll never be a Frank Sinatra or Elvis Presley or a Ray Charles. I'm just an imitator, man. I'm doing a very bad imitation on the bass of Jerry Jemmott, Bernard Odum, Jimmy Fielder, Jimmy Blanton, Igor Stravinsky, Jimi Hendrix, John Coltrane, James Brown, Charlie Parker... the cats, man. I'm just backing up the cats. -- Jaco Pastorius
Oh God almighty, another Detroit monster is Chad Smith of the Chili Peppers. Their music is intoxicating between Flea and Chad Smith. They're contemporary because they're still making good records, but I don't think there's anything new that has a groove and soulfulness. The Chili Peppers just stink of soul-and that's the ultimate compliment. They continue what James Brown created. -- Ted Nugent
Tommy moved on. "Lash, your people have been oppressed for hundreds of years. It's time to strike back. Look, you don't have your MBA yet - they haven't completely juiced you of your usefulness yet. Would Martin Luther King back down from this challenge? Malcolm X? James Brown? Don't you have a dream? Don't you feel good, like you knew that you would, now? -- Christopher Moore
I'd like to have James Brown as my singer. I already have the best drummer, Tommy Clufetos. I've jammed a bunch with John Entwistle, and it was like a musical orgy. That guy is a living, breathing, grunting rhythm. For horns, let's go with the Stax/Volt guys, and I'm going to have Steve Cropper on standby just in case I want a rhythm guitarist. -- Ted Nugent
I drew a lot of inspiration from the Ginuwines, the Ushers, the Michael Jacksons, the James Browns, Sam Cooke. -- Chris Brown
As I always said, if people wanted to know who James Brown is, all they have to do is listen to my music. -- James Brown
The adorably rubber-faced Ken James Stewart is jumping ship from the Shaw Festival after five years to play Charlie Brown -- Richard Ouzounian
I named my new son James Joseph Brown II. I think he's going to be a lot better than I was. -- James Brown

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