My dad and I speak better when we play together.
— Bibi Bourelly
Sometimes I hate writing songs. Because it hurts sometimes. I'm very emotional.
I can deal with imperfection, but I can't deal with people who lie to themselves and lie to the world to make the world feel better.
Working with Rihanna has changed my life.
My dad is Jean-Paul Bourelly, a really prestige guitar player in Europe, and he toured with Miles Davis. I was always surrounded by the most prestige kind of musicians from Senegal, Trinidad, Poland, Nigeria, and all around the world.
Fortunately and unfortunately, what I love entails, and makes, a lot of money.
There's nothing wrong with writing for other artists, but that's just not what my purpose is.
I remember the first time I ever wrote down a song was when I was 6. I was at my friend Emma's house, and we wrote a song called 'Girls' Rules.'
We cannot afford to have lies in music.
There's so much judgment geared toward young girls. People just expect so much from girls. Even physically and aesthetically, people expect us to always look right, to have a certain etiquette - to talk a certain way and act a certain way - and to know certain things. It's all different expectations, but there are always expectations.
A lot of the songs that I wrote during 'Pt. 1' and 'Pt. 2' are the first songs that I ever wrote that sounded like that. I was in this phase - a certain creative space in my life - personally and musically.
I don't want to, in the last three minutes of my life, know that I lived it for somebody else.
I'm just trying to give the world something pure for a change. We'll see what happens.
My goal is to change the art industry.
The way I write music for other artists is the same way I write music for myself. I'll pick up the guitar, and I'll write music, and if I don't use it, I have, like, 500 other songs. If I don't use it, I give it away.
I always do what makes me happy - it doesn't make sense to live life unhappily.
True hopefulness and optimism is what leads one to dare. It is also what lifts one back up to dare again after a failed attempt.
I would never say I 'play' guitar. But yeah, I play to write. Same with piano.
Opportunities don't always come dressed in neon colors.
I want music to really unite people, more than the way a pop single unites people. I want to unite people through their pain and really change mentalities, change minds, and change perspectives.
As far as songwriting, I'm not sure if they wrote all of their own stuff, but I love the Dixie Chicks.
I think that I can't help but put my personal pain in my music because there's a lot of it. That's my therapy.
I'm the type of person who really wants to exist and live honestly, to just say what I have to say and be who I am and do what I want.
My songs are always on the tip of my tongue. It's always bubbling and brewing and about to come out. I can't really put it into words, but the best way to explain it is feeling like you constantly have some things on the tip of your tongue.
I was born in Berlin, and when I was 6, my mom passed. When I was 9, I moved to near Washington, D.C., where I lived with my aunt and uncle. And then at 11, I moved back to Berlin. And then at 16, I got in trouble in school and moved back to the Washington area.
Music is a lot more powerful than anyone gives it credit for. I can sing something right now and make you feel something that you would not feel if I said it. If somebody can sing and connect to people just through voice, just through sonics, capturing an emotion, that's a direct string to somebody's soul.
One of the biggest challenges for me is that I'm still a human being. I'm a very imperfect human being. I'm very open about the fact that I'm not trying to pretend to be better than anyone else.
I'm not a machine that just comes up with records and can give them away easily.
The only thing I can control is myself. I can't control what anyone thinks about me, I can't control circumstance, I can't control the things that God controls.
I want my brand and Bibi Bourelly to represent honesty.
I love creating things that come from my gut and my soul.
It's hard to give your song away. They're like your kids.
I was never necessarily conscious of my failures when I attempted something and it didn't work out, because I feel like I'm so in tune with my purpose I never necessarily acknowledge that.
I'm just tryna make real music. I don't want to force the people to follow me.
Me going to college was not an option.
I think a lot of my angst comes from feeling unaccepted.
A lot of things change when one is granted success: random people pop up, and a lot of the adjustments are rough. My way of coping with them is through focusing on the things that I have accomplished and the things that are yet to come.
My dad raised me on everything from his music to Stevie Wonder to A Tribe Called Quest. I learned the 'Midnight Marauders' album in and out.
If I talk to a new guy, it's because the old guy bores me, and I already wrote a bunch of songs about him.
I've seen people pass away. I've seen how fragile life is.
I just am really bad at making new friends - especially in the music industry, because they're not really real friends; they're just music industry friends.
I just want to unify people. A crowd full of people singing one song... that doesn't derive from anything dishonest... It's someone's truth.
I fell in love with singing, and through singing, I learned how to write songs. Anything you're consistent with and that you do all the time, you're gonna reap benefits off it at one point. You're not gonna get worse!
I love making music. I love that it's unstructured, that I get to go perform and play in front of people, to meet new people. I love to do the thing I'm best at every day.
I'm out here living my dream. People are listening to my music.
I have faith in the people. Honesty will prosper.
I believe that I exist for the people. I'm just here to try to make a difference, and hopefully, the people listen and trust me enough to contribute.
Before I was working professionally, I would do YouTube covers. But as a creative person, it was really hard for me when I wasn't releasing my own music. That felt unnatural to me.
I write songs every day, 14 times a day.
Daring is doing. Daring is asking something outrageous despite your chances of failure and rejection. Daring is going out on a limb by believing in something that no one else understands, and if all fails, daring is trying again.
