“I came out to L.A. to be a songwriter and not an artist, and I’m so excited because I always secretly wanted to be an artist.”

My first date ever, I was kind of nervous, so I was like, ‘I’m going to bring Brady to this walk on the beach with this girl,’ and she was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I have a King Charles Cavalier, too.’ I’m like, ‘Money, perfect, amazing.’

A lot of people don’t know, but New Jersey has, like, 700,000 acres of farmland.

I actually get a lot of messages with people saying, ‘What’s a Marvin Gaye?’ and, I mean… Oh, wow. I must be getting old, because someone who was born in 2004 just asked me what a Marvin Gaye was.

I was carrying my friend in his casket to put him in the hearse, and I was thinking, ‘I need to write a song for this guy, because he always told me I would have a No. 1 song.’

I don’t love the whole Hollywood mentality, but I do love the weather and how motivated everyone is around here. It motivates me to make fun music. I’m an East Coaster – I’m from New Jersey, so I’ll probably feel like that forever.

I listened to a lot of Marvin Gaye and Motown records.

When I get high anxiety, I vomit. My mom was so stressed out. Then I found out I was staying in John Mayer’s old dorm room, and I had a nice roommate. That completely brought me down. I was completely comfortable at Berklee.

One of my goals is to find an unsigned YouTube artist and feature them on my album. That’s what I wished someone would’ve done for me.

I started making remixes for every specific girl I wanted to date. That’s how I learned how to use Pro Tools, and then I started making my own music.

I’ve always made weird sounds with my mouth. I’ve always been fascinated by the sound design, what you can do with your mouth. I was the kid dancing around in third grade on the basketball court. While everyone would be playing sports, I would be jumping around.

It’s crazy because I have a scar on my right eyebrow, but people who don’t know me very well think that I just intentionally shave that part of it.

I started piano when I was four. My mom taught me. And then I went to Manhattan School of Music during high school, like every Saturday. And then I went to Berklee for college, in Boston.

When Marvin Gaye made his music, he evoked this feeling that would reach everybody.

I’ve always weaseled my way into Grammy parties to network and everything, but now I have a legitimate reason to be there – it’s so cool.

The scar on my eye is a result of the doctor’s sewing up my face. It was 450 stitches and plastic surgery.

Everyone’s gone through a breakup, and I’ve dated girls in the past where… I’ve never had a messy breakup, thankfully, but I’m never the one to end it. I’m always caught off guard as to why things ended because I guess I’m oblivious in a way.

There are two men inside the artist, the poet and the craftsman. One is born a poet. One becomes a craftsman.

I want to sell out arenas and make an album and work with some of the best artists in the world.

I am an artist. I am here to live out loud.

I grew up in an artists community in New York, in a building that was government-subsidised for artists. No one made any money, but they made art for the sake of art.

The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.

Love is not only a feeling, it is also an art. A simple word, a sensitive precaution, a mere nothing reveal to a woman the sublime artist who can touch her heart without withering it.

All of the artists did such a beautiful job I can’t thank them enough. I’m just honored that ‘God Only Knows’ was chosen. ‘God Only Knows’ is a very special song. An extremely spiritual song and one of the best I’ve ever written.

A nation devoid of art and artists cannot have a full existence.