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" I'm not a natural. I had to teach myself - or be taught - everything I do. I just spent hours and hours in the mirror mimicking Michael Jackson. "

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" Sammy was the only one that looked like me, so I naturally gravitated to him. Sammy made it cool to be black at a time when, let's just say it, it wasn't very cool to be black. His name was on the front of the building in lights, and he had to go in the back. But you never saw him sweat. "

" Me being an artist working with dancers and seeing how hard they work, they are the first to show up and the last to leave. They work just as hard, if not harder, than me - and they never get credit for it. "

" I've been a huge Adele fan since I heard her album '19.' "

" I wrote a song that basically turned into a public service announcement for the fellas out there, like, 'Should you run into this type of woman, run for your life!' So the name of the song is 'Run,' featuring the rapper ScHoolboy Q. It's one of the standouts on the album, in my personal opinion. "

" I pride myself on being the type of artist who can work half in the R&B world and half in the pop world. "

" Beyonce's the kind of artist where you're not gonna see it till it's right. "

" Via social media, I reached out, asking about relationships, dreams, hopes, fears, the whole gambit, and the stories that really resonated with me, I wrote songs about. "

" There's a whole advantage being an executive as an artist. "

" I'm trying to escape the shackles of a pen and a pad. I've sat in sessions with Jay-Z where he doesn't write anything down. He'll come up with the most incredible triple entendre, all in his head - it's amazing. "

" Doing as much as you can for as long as you can - that's the motto. "

" My first song was 'So Sick,' which was my first number one as an artist, and I turned the mic around to the crowd, and they sang the whole song. Every lyric. That was my first experience with the power of music. "

" I know everyone says attention spans are shorter now, and if you can't get them in the first 20 seconds, you lost them. But I honestly believe if you give someone something worth slowing down to really pay attention to, they will. "

" We're falling into a place where melody is somewhat lacking in music. Everybody feels like, okay, too much melody or too much harmony, and it kind of goes over people's heads; they don't understand it. "

" For my prom, I wore a white suit with a burgundy shirt, tie and cummerbund, along with white shoes, a white trilby and a cane. I was extra fly that day. "

" I'm good but not great at 'Madden'. I have friends that their whole life is based around this video game. "

" I'm the type of guy to put the water on the stove and then walk away and 10 seconds later be like, 'Come on, boil'! "

" Guilty pleasure implies that it's something that I feel guilty for watching... people tell me I should feel guilty for watching because I'm too old to watch it, but I don't give a damn: I love everything on Cartoon Network from 'Adventure Time' to 'The Adventures of Gumball', 'Teen Titans'... all those shows that are for my kids, I like those! "

" The name of the album is 'Non-Fiction'. And, I'm calling it that because the name of every song on this album is derived from a true story. Now, some of the stories are mine. Some of the stories belong to some of my fans. "

" I am blessed to be doing what I do. So if I have to be at a photo shoot, do an interview, or make a TV appearance, I am not going to sit around whining and complaining about how I don't want to get up early or I don't feel like talking. "

" Prince is the ultimate performer. Prince is that dude that's going to get on stage by himself, if he need to, but hold you in the palm of his hand. Like, you can't take your eyes off the man when he's on stage, and he could just be sitting there playing his guitar. "

" For the first few years of my life my mom used to cut my hair so there were a lot of bowl-cut hair styles. "

" There's no recreating what Michael Jackson and Diana Ross did in 'The Wiz'. We're trying to figure out who these characters are in 2015. How would these times change their motives, change the things they would say and do? "

" I've never viewed myself as above anybody else or anything like that. I'm a regular guy at the end of the day. I like Cinnamon Toast Crunch and The Powerpuff Girls. "

" I needed to be sexier. I needed to be more hip. I needed to be more edgy and this and that. 'No, don't write that kind of song, write this type of song. No, don't work with that producer, work with this producer. No, don't wear those clothes, wear these clothes.' And I didn't want to be a puppet, you know? "

" I've never been the guy to go for the celebrity girl. I've always liked regular girls, regular people, because I've always viewed myself as a regular person who just happens to be gifted in music. "

" I never really created a difference between Shaffer Smith, my actual name, and Ne-Yo. They are kind of one in the same. It's been a bit of a gift and a curse. As far as Shaffer Smith is concerned, I've never viewed myself as a celebrity. "

" I feel like everything is inspired by something else. There is no 100 percent original thought. "

" R&B is my home. It's who I am. It's who I've been. It's the first genre I fell in love with. It's the reason why I've been able to do other genres of music. "

" The Auto-Tune makes everybody sound the same and takes away all of the emotion because you're singing through this machine, and of course your taking all of this emotion out of your voice for the most part. "

" I always tell the story of 'Irreplaceable.' I initially wrote 'Irreplaceable' with myself in mind, with plans of it being my record. I love that record; however, what I realised about that record was that though given the circumstances of that situation - men and women are not that different - when you sing about it, it changes things, you know? "