My whole career began because I was always putting my music on the Internet. By the time I had my first tour, I had an audience everywhere I went, because people were listening online. I started with a website, Jasonmraz.com, pre-YouTube. You could e-mail me directly, and I would send you a CD.
My parents dreaded the fact that I was changing my life to do this, but I just kept doing it.
I started with a website, Jasonmraz.com, pre-YouTube. You could e-mail me directly, and I would send you a CD.
A rescue mission doesn't involve going in and just taking a child and leaving. You can't just choose any child at random. Every kid has a case that is based on that child's original family. So, we made it over to a village, found the child; we were interacting with the child.
But my strength was in singing and songwriting, which was a new discovery for me when I was 18. And I decided if I pursued songwriting, which is what was closest to my heart, then there would be no competition. I would just live my life being myself and living my dream.
Songs always get better after you start playing them live.
Paul McCartney and John Lennon would often write a song a day, so I have the same workmanlike philosophy.
Traveling has a major impact on what I do, cause all over the world I'm meeting all kinds of people. And relationships is the second major impact that I have. I just enjoy the variety that the world has to offer.
'Yes' is the mother of all positive words, next to 'love.' Maybe 'love' is the father of all positive words.
My strength was in singing and songwriting, which was a new discovery for me when I was 18. And I decided if I pursued songwriting, which is what was closest to my heart, then there would be no competition. I would just live my life being myself and living my dream.
There's not much cooking in our household. We do a lot of raw food, so it's more about putting the right ingredients together to create something scrumptious.
I think anyone who uses the web is smart and will profit.
Growing up as a singer, and a cast member, and now as an adult, a songwriter, I get the luxury of choosing the kinds of songs that I want to sing, because I'll write, you know, hundreds of songs. Even though only 12 appear on the album. That's 12 that I've chosen to sing of my catalog.
I buy records from all across the board. I get kind of a hybrid of influences in my own music.
In Buddhism, they say attachment to anything only leads to suffering. So when we laugh, it's our way of saying, 'I'm unattached to that.' You're tickled by it, it makes your lobes do something on their own. So humor is very important to me. I always take that to the stage first.
I don't follow any of what the pop world is doing. Sometimes I feel like that's a weakness, actually, that I'm too in my own bubble. But I'm really just interested in the inner journey. And pop is all about the exterior world, the material.
In one of my songs, I say fame is nothing more than loving someone. So I'm grateful every day that there's so many fans of people out there that love my music and feel they're connected to me through that.
There's a certain feeling of giving, a certain feeling of generosity in love songs. When you sing a song of love, you're actually giving something to yourself, too. You're singing and casting these affirmations of love out into the universe. It resonates in your body in a way that feels extraordinary.
Our shows are packed with laughter and light-hearted songs to lift the listener from their everyday life. We encourage the audience to participate in any way.
I think these days, new artists have a tendency to try to cut corners.
